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SOCIALISM 
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By   GAYLORD   WILSHIRE 


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200  WILLIAM  STREET 
NEW  YORK 


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Socialism  Inevitable 

(WlLSHIRE  EDITORIALS) 


BY 


GAYLORD    WlLSHIRE 

Editor  Wilshire's  Magazine 


THERE  can  be  no 
Kope  of  progress  or 
freedom  for  the 
people  without  the  un- 
restricted and  complete 
enjoyment  of  the  right 
of  free  speech,  free  press 
and  peaceful  assembly. 


Gift  of 
IRA  B.  CROSS 


WlLSHIRE  BOOK  COMPANY 

200  William   Street 
NEW  YORK 


Copyright,   1907,  by 
WILSHIRE  BOOK  CO. 


HlCtb 


CONTENTS 


Page. 

Preface  to  Wilshire's  Editorials 7 

Preface  to  Socialism  Inevitable 10 

Why  a  Workingman  Should  Be  a  Socialist 13 

Salutory.     (From  The  Challenge) 22 

Old  Lady's  Ailment,  The.     (From  The  Challenge) 26 

Capitalism  Breeds  no  Horatius.     (From  The  Challenge) 28 

Psychological  Problem,  A 32 

Columbia's  Race  for  Liberty 37 

Fallacy  of  Public  Ownership,  The 45 

Trust  Overshadows  All  Issues,  The 53 

Prophecy  of  1891,  A 62 

True  Joy  of  Life,  The 67 

Two  World  Conquerors 71 

An  International  Office  Seeker 78 

Addams,  Jane — Artist  82 

Why  Save  Men's  Souls? 86 

How  High  Can  Wages  Go? 89 

American  Ideal,  The 93 

Classes   in   America 97 

Mysterious  Mr.  Hearst,  The 100 

Talk  With  Rockefeller,  A 102 

"Merger '"  Decision,  The 110 

Hop  Lee  and  the  Pelican 112 

Coffee,  Currants  and  Oranges 116 

Financial  Cataclysm  Inevitable,  A 119 

Undigested  Securities  126 

Sequel  to  a  Modern  Romance,  The 130 

3 


454632 


4  Contents 

Pag( 

White  Collars  and  a  Yellow  Press 13 

Sippers  of  Carlsbad,  The 13 

Monopoly  a  Necessity 14 

Gompers  and  His  Little  Plan,  Mr 14 

America  Suffocating  With  Wealth 15 

Wall  Street  Journal  Turns  Moralist 15 

Wallace's  Great  Book 15 

Spencer,  Herbert   16 

"Right  to  Work,"  The 16 

Wilshire's  Exile  to  End 17 

Bryan  Will  Discuss  Socialism 17 

How   We  Will   Divide 17 

Good  Old  Rockefeller 17 

Bryan   Explains   Socialism 18 

Strikers  and  the  Meat  Trust,  The 18; 

Science  Benefits  the  Rich 18< 

What  Good  is  Government  Ownership? 18! 

When  Men  Love  Nature 191 

How  to  be  Happy 191 

^     Shaw's  "Super-Man" 19! 

What  Men  Vote  For 20: 

Class  vs.  Class:    Resultant 20' 

World  Trust,  A 21< 

Death  of  the  Democratic  Party,  The 21' 

Two  Nations,  The 22: 

Inexorable  Trust,  The 225 

Rights  of  a  Wheelbarrow,  The 22! 

«/-  What  is  Religion? 23( 

—  We  Feed  Our  Buffaloes,  but  Starve  Ourselves 23! 

.     Is  Socialism  Practicable? 23J 

Virchow's  Cell  Theory 23! 

—    Left  at  the  Evening  Post 231 

Ten-Hour  Decision,  The 24] 


Contents  5 

Page. 

Distribution  the  Problem 245 

Mutation  Theory  Applied  to  Society,  The 250 

An  Easy  Way  to  Wealth,  Wish  For  It 261 

Municipal  Ownership — Its  Meaning. 268 

Money  Under  Socialism 279 

New  Shoes  for  Old  Ballots 282 

Wilshire's  and  the  Crisis 284 

Strike  to  Set  Them  Free 286 

Roosevelt's  Muck  Rake 290 

Effect  of  the  Earthquake  on  Socialism 292 

Feudalism  Versus  Capitalism  in  Russia 294 

Socialism:    A  Religion 297 

Boom  of  1906,  The 304 

A  Wilshire  Prophecy  of  1889 310 

From  Chance  to  Certainty 313 

The  Significance  of  the  Trust 319 


PREFACE  TO  WILSHIRE'S  EDITORIALS 


THE  contents  of  this  volume  consist  almost  exclusively  of 
my  editorials  published  within  the  past  six  years  either 
in  Wilshire's  Magazine  or  in  The  Challenge,  its 
predecessor.  The  burden  of  my  song,  as  the  reader  will  quickly 
gather,  is  that  an  industrial  cataclysm,  as  the  result  of  over- 
production, is  about  to  appear  in  the  United  States. 

I  predict  this  notwithstanding  the  fact  that  we  are  to-day 
in  the  fever  of  a  greater  industrial  expansion  than  the  coun- 
try has  ever  before  experienced.  It  seems  impossible  to 
produce  enough.  Factories  are  over-burdened  with  orders. 
Our  mines  of  copper,  lead,  zinc,  silver  and  iron  are  being 
worked  day  and  night  under  the  stimulus  of  tremendously 
high  prices,  and  yet  are  unable  to  supply  demand. 

My  endeavor,  however,  has  been  to  show  that  all  this  activ- 
ity is  ephemeral  and  temporary ;  that  the  great  demand  arises 
rather  from  consumption  by  the  capitalists  of  goods  for  new 
capital  expenditure,  than  from  any  demand  by  the  workers 
for  the  necessities  of  life.  The  increased  demand,  in  short, 
is  for  pig-iron,  not  pig-meat. 

The  essential  difference  between  the  two  demands,  speaking 
economically,  is  that  one  will  cease  as  soon  as  the  new 
machinery  is  built,  and  that  the  other,  based  on  human 
hunger,  can  never  cease.  And  I  find  in  the  Trust  a  sign  that 
the  industrial  demand  for  new  machinery  is  coming  to  a 
close;  the  Trust  is  manifestly  a  necessary  device  of  the  cap- 
italist to  subdue  the  ill  effects  of  over-production,  in  being,  or 
in  prospect. 


8  Socialism  Inevitable 

Our  immensely  increased  capacity  to  produce,  as  the  result 
of  the  use  of  better  and  still  better  machinery,  has  not  been 
accompanied  by  any  superior  facilities  for  distribution  and 
consumption,  except  to  the  extent  that  the  capitalists  have 
found  an  opportunity  to  expand  their  plants.  The  workers 
cannot,  to  any  extent,  increase  their  power  of  consumption, 
because  that  power  is  limited  by  their  wage,  and  wages  are 
forced  by  competition  to  remain  at  about  the  point  of  sub- 
sistence. Money  wages,  it  is  true,  have  increased  somewhat 
in  the  last  few  years,  but  the  rise  in  price  of  living  has  kept 
real  wages  down  to  about  the  same  old  level. 

The  present  period  of  great  expansion  is,  to  my  mind, 
directly  traceable  to  the  stimulus  given  by  the  three  great 
wars  with  which  the  world  has  lately  been  scourged.  I  refer 
to  the  Spanish- American  war  (1898),  the  Boer-British  South 
African  war  (1899-1902),  and,  finally,  to  the  Kusso- Japanese 
war  (1904-1905).  The  effect  of  the  Eusso- Japanese  war, 
indeed,  is  seen  in  our  present  great  industrial  prosperity ;  but 
I  think  that  its  influence  cannot  last  much  longer  than  a  year 
from  to-day. 

I  believe,  when  the  collapse  of  the  present  boom  shall 
usher  in  a  huge  unemployed  problem,  that  the  workers  of  the 
United  States,  knowing  they  produce  so  much  more  than 
they  can  buy,  will  refuse  to  be  placated  by  any  reasoning  of 
the  capitalists  to  the  effect  that  they  must  expect  to  go 
hungry.  The  time  has  passed  when  the  people  will  be  sat- 
isfied to  starve  because  they  produce  too  much  food. 

The  day,  certainly,  has  gone  forever  when  the  people  of  a 
whole  village  will  submit  to  death  from  typhoid  fever  because 
the  doctors  and  preachers  pronounce  it  a  visitation  of  God  as 
a  punishment  for  their  unrighteousness.  They  now  know  that 
typhoid  comes  with  a  polluted  water  supply,  and  will  pro- 
ceed to  purify  that  supply  at  once.  And  so  it  will  be  with 
us  Americans  in  regard  to  death  from  starvation  when  the 


Preface  To  Wilshires  Editorials  9     , 

capitalist,  owing  to  over-production,  can  no  longer  employ 
us.  Some  years  ago  we  would  have  quietly  starved,  thinking 
that  panics  and  trade  depressions  were  mysterious  events 
visited  upon  man  by  a  divine  providence,  into  whose  ways  it 
was  profane  to  explore.  Now  we  know  differently.  We  know 
that  trade  depression  is  caused  by  over-production,  which,  in 
turn,  is  due  to  the  inability  of  the  workers  to  buy  with  their 
low  wages  what  they  produce.  And  we  know,  furthermore, 
that  low  wages  are  caused  by  competition  between  workers — 
by  the  competitive  system.  Hence  we  see  that  the  basis  of  all 
the  trouble  is  in  the  competitive  system. 

My  editorials  are  built  upon  this  theory,  and  try  to  show 
how,  by  the  substitution  of  the  co-operative  system — Social- 
ism— we  can  solve  the  industrial  problem  now  threatening  us. 

GAYLORD  WILSHIRE. 
November  14th,  1906. 


PREFACE    TO    "SOCIALISM    INEVITABLE" 


THE  success  of  Wilshire  Editorials  has  been  so  pro- 
nounced that  I  have  carefully  revised  and  rearranged 
its  contents  for  future  editions.  Even  the  title  has 
been  changed,  in  keeping  with  the  more  permanent  character 
of  the  work,  though  with  no  intention  of  hiding  the  fact 
that  the  matter  possesses  both  the  flavor  and  the  faults  of 
hasty  journalistic  utterances.  There  is,  of  course,  much  repe- 
tition as  well;  but  since  I  know  of  no  subject  that  can  stand 
more  repetition  than  the  abuses  of  Capitalism,  the  advent  of 
the  Trust  and  the  inevitability  of  Socialism,  I  have  frequently 
refrained  from  using  the  blue  pencil  where,  as  the  literary 
critic  will  probably  inform  me,  it  might  have  been  most 
advantageously  employed. 

The  articles  herein  are  now  placed  in  the  order  in  which 
they  appeared  in  the  magazine,  and  this,  I  hope,  will  give  a 
certain  insight  into  the  evolution  of  our  society  and  the 
progress  of  Socialism  that  the  future  historian  and  student 
may  be  glad  to  acquire.  In  any  case  the  book  appears  at  a 
moment  when  the  very  name  of  Socialism  attracts  widespread 
attention,  and  so  can  hardly  fail  to  be  of  service  to  the  move- 
ment, hence  to  the  nation  at  large,  and  to  all  humanity. 

The  preface  to  the  first  edition,  written  last  November, 
wherein  I  predicted  that  "prosperity"  would  hardly  last  with 
us  over  a  year  longer,  has  been  completely  verified.  The  ter- 
rific slump  in  the  stock  market  of  last  October,  and  the  finan- 
cial and  industrial  collapse  which  has  followed,  presage  a 
great  unemployed  problem.    A  war  between  Japan  and  Amer- 

10 


Preface  To  Socialism  Inevitable  11 

ica  is  to  my  mind  the  only  possible  event  that  offers  tven  a 
temporary  solution  to  the  problem. 

Of  course  I  do  not  look  for  the  capitalists  deliberately  to 
go  about  saving  society  by  bringing  on  a  war  with  Japan, 
because  I  neither  credit  them  with  the  brains  to  see  the  profit 
in  such  a  war,  nor  the  heartlessness  to  seek  profits  at  such  a 
terrible  cost.  Nevertheless,  I  can  foresee  that  events  may 
easily  shape  themselves  to  bring  on  such  a  war. 

At  the  very  first  approach  of  an  unemployed  problem  the 
animosity  of  our  white  laborers  against  the  Japanese  laborers 
in  the  Western  States  is  sure  to  be  displayed  by  outrages  in 
far  greater  number  and  importance  than  those  in  San  Fran- 
cisco, which  have  lately  given  rise  to  so  much  indignation. 
And  right  now  Japanese  are  being  introduced  into  the  mines 
in  our  Western  States,  naturally  much  to  the  resentment  of 
the  whites  who  are  displaced. 

When  some  twenty-five  years  ago  there  was  an  attempt 
made  to  introduce  Chinese  labor  into  the  mines  on  the 
Pacific  Coast  it  resulted  in  so  much  violence  on  the  part  of 
the  whites  that  it  had  to  be  abandoned.  But  the  Chinese 
then  had  no  powerful  government  with  the  prestige  of  vic- 
torious arms  to  protest  at  their  treatment,  such  as  have  the 
Japanese  to-day,  and  even  if  they  had  I  doubt  if  the  result 
would  have  been  different.  The  whites  felt  that  they  were 
fighting  for  their  lives  when  they  fought  for  their  jobs,  and 
they  will  feel  the  same  when  now  they  are  brought  into  com- 
petition with  the  Japanese  in  this  period  of  depression  and 
unemployment. 

It  will  be  a  most  fortunate  thing  for  America  if  a  labor 
conflict  in  British  Columbia  with  the  Japanese  should  force 
Great  Britain  to  show  us  the  best  method  to  solve  a  very 
difficult  problem. 

While  all  this  is  not  absolutely  pertinent  to  my  theory 
of  the  near  approach  of  a  great  industrial  crisis,  it  cer- 


12  Socialism  Inevitable 

tainly  must  afford  food  for  thought  when  it  is  understood 
that  the  Socialists  declare  that  nothing  but  the  waste  of  war 
keeps  the  present  system  of  society  going,  and  that  the  system, 
in  turn,  breeds  conditions  that  make  war  between  nations 
almost  inevitable  either  through  such  accidental  conditions 
as  happen  to  exist  through  the  presence  of  Japanese  laborers 
competing  with  whites  in  America  or  through  the  animosi- 
ties engendered  between  nations  in  the  scramble  for  inter- 
national trade. 

GAYLORD  WILSHIRE. 
Dec.  14,  1907. 


WHY   A   WORKINGMAN    SHOULD    BE    A 
SOCIALIST 

A  SOCIALIST  is  one  who  desires  that  the  wealth  of 
the  nation  be  owned  collectively  by  all  the  people 
rather  than  individually  by  a  small  fraction  of  them, 
called  capitalists.  By  "wealth  of  the  nation"  is  meant  the 
land,  the  railroads,  the  telegraphs,  the  flour  mills,  the  oil 
refineries;  in  short,  all  those  agencies  by  means  of  which  food, 
clothing  and  other  commodities  are  produced. 

By  Socialism  we  mean  the  government  ownership  and  man- 
agement of  all  wealth-producing  industries.  For  instance, 
just  as  certain  institutions,  such  as  the  common  schools,  the 
post  office,  etc.,  are  now  owned  and  managed  by  the  people; 
under  Socialism,  not  only  these,  but  all  our  industries  would 
be  so  owned  and  managed.  In  short,  Socialists  propose,  in- 
stead of  permitting  Morgan  and  Eockefeller  to  own  the 
United  States  and  run  it  for  their  selfish  interests,  that  we — 
the  people — shall  assume  possession  of  it  ourselves  and  run 
it  for  our  own  benefit. 

This  is  such  a  very  simple  proposition  that  anyone  should 
be  able  to  understand  it;  and  that  every  patriotic  American, 
and  especially  every  workingman,  is  not  in  favor  of  Socialism 
can  be  explained  only  by  his  ignorance  of  what  Socialism 
really  is.  It  is  surely  a  praiseworthy  sentiment  in  a  people 
to  desire  to  own  their  native  land,  and  quite  as  natural  and 
praiseworthy  as  for  a  man  to  wish  to  own  his  home  instead 
of  renting  it  of  a  landlord. 

We  say  that  every  workingman  who  understood  what  So- 
cialism meant  would  certainly  become  a  Socialist,  for  as- 
suredly his  condition  in  life  is  not  such  that  he  should  fear 
a  change.  You  who  read  this,  perhaps,  are  poor;  you  are 
dissatisfied,  or  at  least  you  ought  to  be  dissatisfied,  with  your 
lot  in  life;  you  have  a  sense  of  being  unjustly  dealt  with  by 
society.    You  know  that  your  labor,  alone,  produces  all  the 

13 


14  Socialism  Inevitable 

good  things  of  life,  and  that  some  one  else  enjoys  them;  you 
know  all  this,  and  you  know,  or  should  know,  that  so  simple 
a  thing  as  casting  your  ballot  intelligently  can  produce  a 
change,  so  that  you  yourself  will  receive  and  enjoy  all  the 
fruits  of  your  labor,  with  no  necessity  of  giving  the  lion's 
share,  or  any  share  at  all,  to  Rockefeller,  Vanderbilt  &  Co. 

It  is  true  that  there  is  some  excuse  for  your  not  realizing 
that  the  shackles  which  tie  you  to  poverty  are  but  figments 
of  your  imagination.  You  are  befooled  and  humbugged  at 
every  source  to  which  you  might  look  for  information.  The 
newspapers,  ostensibly  devoted  to  the  interests  of  the  work- 
ingmen,  in  reality  are  but  the  tools  of  the  capitalists — their 
owners. 

Now  reflect  on  your  condition  and  consider  that  you  are  a 
citizen  of  the  United  States,  a  country  possessing  natural 
resources  capable  of  easily  supporting  more  than  ten  times 
its  present  population.  You  are  informed  by  unchallenged 
and  uncontrovertible  statistics  that,  through  the  development 
of  the  steam  engine  and  labor-saving  machinery,  the  labor 
of  one  man  can  to-day  produce  commodities — food,  clothing, 
lodging,  etc. — sufficient  to  provide  comfortably  for  twenty; 
and  yet  the  fact  stares  you  in  the  face  that  the  return  you 
get  for  your  labor  scarcely  keeps  you  alive.  Knowing  these 
things,  can  you  remain  contented  under  a  social  system  that 
gives  you  an  existence  more  miserable  than  that  of  a  slave? 
Do  you  never  wonder  to  whom  the  surplus  goes,  and  why? 

Let  us  put  the  matter  clearly  before  you.  The  capitalist 
class  owns  the  essentials  of  production — that  is,  the  railways, 
the  flour  mills,  the  oil  and  sugar  refineries,  etc.,  and  the  land. 
Now,  to  get  clothing,  food  and  lodging,  both  land  and  ma- 
chinery must  be  employed,  and  if  one  class  owns  these  essen- 
tials of  production,  it  is  evident  that  it  can  demand  of  you, 
the  class  which  does  not  own  them,  as  much  rent  as  it  pleases 
for  the  use  of  them.  And  what  does  it  choose  to  demand? 
Everything  that  you  produce,  except  the  very  small  part 
called  "wages,"  or  "salaries/5  which  it  allows  you  to  keep  to 
sustain  your  existence.  You  are  in  nearly  the  same  position 
as  a  horse,  in  that  you  can  never  expect  to  get  any  more  than 
just  enough  to  keep  you  in  working  condition.  The  chief 
difference  is  that  the  employer  of  the  horse  feeds  him  even 
when  he  cannot  for  the  time  being  use  him,  while  your  em- 


Why  A  Workingman  Should  Be  A  Socialist      15 

ployer  feeds  you  only  when  you  are  useful  to  him,  and  when 
you  are  not — as  in  dull  seasons — he  lets  you  out  to  starve,  so 
far  as  he  is  concerned.  He  loses  money  if  his  horse  dies,  but 
he  loses  nothing  if  you  die. 

You  may  ask,  why  don't  capitalists  pay  higher  wages? 
Why  don't  they  pay  wages  sufficient  to  allow  you  properly  to 
feed  and  clothe  yourselves  and  your  families?  Furthermore, 
why  don't  workingmen  successfully  demand  wages  sufficient 
to  enable  them  to  educate  their  children  in  the  public  schools? 
What  a  mockery  are  free  schools,  when  we  must  send  our 
children  to  the  mine  and  the  factory  to  earn  food  for  the 
family! 

The  answer  is  short  and  simple.  As  long  as  there  are  mil- 
lions of  unemployed  men  in  the  United  States  only  too  glad 
to  get  a  chance  to  work  for  wages  that  will  afford  the  bare 
necessities  of  life,  wages  will  never  rise.  Consider  a  familiar 
every-day  occurrence  in  business  life.  A  and  B  each  own  a 
coal  mine.  Owing  to  competition  each  is  forced  to  sell  his 
coal  at  the  lowest  price  possible.  Now  the  cost  of  labor  being 
the  chief  item  in  the  expense  of  mining  coal,  if  A  pays  his 
men  less  than  B,  it  follows  that  he  is  in  a  position  to  under- 
sell B,  and,  unless  B  can  manage  to  get  his  labor  as  cheap  as 
A,  he  must  retire  from  business,  for  he  can  sell  no  coal.  The 
capitalists  under  our  competitive  system  could  not  pay  higher 
wages,  even  though  they  might  wish  to  do  so. 

Then,  on  the  other  hand,  consider  the  laborer — the  miner. 
Suppose  that  he  is  getting  two  dollars  a  day  and  that  some 
poor  fellows  out  of  employment  come  along — immigrants,  for 
instance,  who,  rather  than  starve,  offer  to  work  for  one  dollar 
a  day.  It  is  certain  that,  as  the  owners  of  the  mines  are 
forced  to  buy  the  cheapest  labor  offered,  our  two-dollar-a-day 
laborer  must  accept  a  reduction  in  his  wages  to  one  dollar  or 
be  replaced  by  the  immigrant.  Hence  we  can  see  how  it  is 
that  the  pressure  of  the  unemployed  upon  the  labor  market 
always  keeps  the  price  of  labor  at  the  lowest  notch.  And 
the  more  labor-saving  machinery  that  is  introduced,  the 
greater  the  number  thrown  out  of  employment,  and  the 
fiercer  the  struggle  to  get  hired  at  any  price. 

Now  once  recognizing  this  fact  that  low  wages  are  due  to 
our  present  competitive  system,  one  can  easily  see  how  absurd 
it  is  for  Democrats  and  Eepublicans  to  claim  that  either  high 


16  Socialism  Inevitable 

or  low  tariff  can  ever  make  wages  high.  And  workingmen 
are  at  last  coming  to  recognize  the  fact  that  there  is  no  re- 
liance to  be  placed  on  either  of  the  old  parties,  and  that  they 
must  organize  a  party  of  their  own  which  will  do  away  with 
the  competitive  wage  system  entirely,  and  substitute  the  co- 
operative system. 

Workingmen — Americans!  The  issue  is  plain.  Yours  is 
the  choice — whether  you  will  remain  slaves  in  your  own 
country,  fettered  by  your  own  hands,  to  see  your  wives  and 
your  children  live  in  poverty  and  squalor,  aye,  and  often 
starve  before  your  very  eyes;  or  whether  you  will  be  free  men, 
not  in  name  only,  but  in  reality — whether  you  will  own  your 
own  country  and  enjoy  the  full  fruits  of  your  honest  labor. 

You  may  say:  "Ah,  well!  Those  are  fine  words;  but  it  is 
impossible  for  anything  to  be  done.  Workingmen  always 
have  been  poor  and  always  will  be.  You  Socialists  merely 
make  us  feel  our  poverty  more  keenly — make  us  discontented, 
without  showing  us  any  practicable  plan  to  abolish  the  causes 
of  our  discontent.  Of  course  we  want  to  be  in  better  circum- 
stances; of  course  we  wish  to  provide  better  for  our  families. 
Certainly  we  would  rather  send  our  children  to  school  than 
to  the  factory.  We  know  that  we  are  virtually  slaves,  and 
we  should  like  nothing  better  than  to  end  our  slavery.  What 
fool  would  not  have  his  fellow  men  own  their  own  country, 
rather  than  the  capitalists?  But  even  supposing  the  wealth 
of  the  nation  were  divided  up,  as  we  suppose  you  Socialists 
propose,  it  would  simply  be  a  question  of  time  until  Kocke- 
feller  &  Co.  would  have  it  all  back  again." 

Workingmen,  you  are  mistaken:  Socialists  do  propose  a 
most  practicable  solution  of  the  problem  of  how  to  abolish 
poverty  permanently.  If  you  will  consider  our  plan  you  can- 
not help  but  agree  that  its  accomplishment  would  prevent 
any  fear  of  Kockefeller  &  Co.  ever  getting  our  country  away 
from  us  after  it  is  once  restored.  Socialism  means  anything 
but  the  division  of  wealth.  It  means  the  absolute  concentra- 
tion of  the  ownership  of  the  wealth  of  the  country  into  the 
collective  control  and  ownership  of  the  people  themselves, 
through  the  government.  The  only  division  that  Socialists 
propose  is  the  fair  division  of  commodities  produced,  but  they 
never  propose  the  division  of  the  ownership  of  the  machinery 
that  produces  commodities.    For  instance,  the  people  (the 


Why  A  Woekingman  Should  Be  A  Socialist      17 

government)  will  collectively  own  both  the  land,  the  grain 
elevators  and  the  flour  mills,  while  you  and  I  individually 
will  own  the  product:   the  bread. 
,- /'As  to  the  practicability  of  the  government  ownership  of 
'/the  means  of  production,  it  is  best  answered  by  the  considera- 
■  tion  of  the  excellent  management  of  such  machinery  as  is 
now  under  the  control  of  the  government,  such  as  the  post 
office,  the  public  schools,  the  Panama  Kailway,  etc.    When, 
by  the  mismanagement  of  private  owners,  some  railway  is 
thrown  into  the  bankruptcy  court,  and  the  government  is 
forced  to  take  control  and  conduct  it  through  a  receiver,  it  is 
a  well-known  fact  that  such  government  management  has 
been  uniformly  successful.    So,  if  the  people  can  successfully 
operate  bankrupt  railroads,  why  should  they  not  be  able  to 
)  operate  solvent  and  successful  railroads?    Indeed  the  question 
is  already  answered,  for  government  ownership  of  railways 
and  telegraphs  is  the  usual  method  in  Europe  and  Australia. 
As  a  matter  of  fact  there  is  really  no  serious  attempt  to 
v^deny  the  feasibility  of  government  ownership,  and  what  we 
will  now  demonstrate  is,  not  its  practicability,  but  its  abso- 
lute necessity,  as  applied  to  all  the  means  of  production,  if 
we  wish  to  save  ourselves  from  starvation.     It  seems  para- 
doxical, but  nevertheless  it  is  true,  that  the  greater  the  pro- 
ductiveness of  machinery,  the  more  difficult  it  is  for  the 
laborer  to  get  the  product.    Let  us  consider  the  present  state 
of  industry  in  the  United  States. 

Within  the  last  few  years  the  owners  of  the  various  gTeat 
industries  of  this  country,  through  the  tremendous  develop- 
ment of  their  plants,  and  the  consequent  fierce  competition 
to  sell  goods,  have  been  compelled  to  consolidate  their  inter- 
ests into  Trusts  to  preserve  themselves  from  bankruptcy,  ow- 
ing to  overproduction  and  the  threat  of  resultant  low  prices. 
Considering  the  millions  of  poorly  clothed  and  underfed 
men,  women  and  children,  it  may  seem  to  many  that  the 
excuse  of  "overproduction"  advanced  for  the  existence  of  the 
Trust  is  the  boldest  of  lies. 

But  it  must  be  remembered  that  the  owners  of  the  sugar 
trust,  the  beef  trust  and  other  trusts  are  not  in  business  from 
philanthropic  motives,  but  to  make  money.  Hence  the  mere 
fact  of  people  starving  for  the  want  of  what  their  machin- 
ery produces  does  not  constitute  any  sound  business  reason 


18  Socialism  Inevitable 

for  capitalists  to  feed  them.  Unless  people  have  money  they 
have  no  legal  right  to  food.  So  we  see  that  as  far  as  the  cap- 
italist is  concerned  there  is  "overproduction"  when  he  finds 
no  buyers,  notwithstanding  that  there  may  be  plenty  who 
want  but  have  no  money  to  buy. 

In  a  country  as  productive  as  the  United  States  and  where 
wage-workers — the  great  consuming  class — are  paid  such  a 
small  part  of  what  is  produced,  there  must  always  be  danger 
of  a  great  surplus  remaining  in  the  hands  of  the  capitalists 
unless  they  avoid  such  a  result  either  by  increasing  consump- 
tion or  by  restricting  production;  and  restricting  production 
means  the  shutting  down  of  factories,  turning  out  of  employ- 
ment willing  workers  to  starve  in  the  midst  of  plenty. 

The  critical  period,  viz.,  that  of  a  great  unemployed  ques- 
tion, has  so  far  been  avoided  only  by  reason  of  the  constant 
progress  of  invention,  which  has  given  the  capitalists  an  op- 
portunity to  increase  consumption  and  at  the  same  time  to 
make  a  good  profit  in  employing  workingmen  both  in  the 
building  of  new  machinery  and  in  the  reconstruction  of  old. 
For  instance,  within  the  last  few  years  the  street  car  lines 
have  been  transformed  from  the  horse-power  systems  to  elec- 
tric power,  which  has  given  employment  to  thousands  of  men. 
So  as  long  as  there  is  a  demand  for  new  machinery  there  is 
always  life  for  the  existing  social  system,  since  labor  can  be 
kept  satisfied  by  being  employed.  ^___ — — - — -" 

The  appearance  of  the  Trust,  however,  means  that  the 
making  of  more  machinery  is  becoming  unnecessary.  The 
existing  machines  are  not  only  sufficient  for  the  demand,  but 
as  a  matter  of  fact  the  capitalists  say  that  there  are  already 
too  many.  And  the  Trust  is  a  necessity,  they  say,  not  only 
to  prevent  production  of  unnecessary  machinery,  but  to  pre- 
vent the  operation  of  the  existing  surplus  machinery  in  pro- 
ducing surplus  goods  which  can  only  be  sold  at  a  loss. 

Now  Socialists  are  quite  in  accord  with  the  capitalists  in 
declaring  that  anti-trust  laws  are  absurd,  since  Trusts  are  a 
necessary  development  of  our  competitive  system,  yet  at  the 
same  time  we  realize  that  the  Trusts  are  the  forerunners  of  a 
huge  unemployed  problem.  For  while  the  Trust  solves  tem- 
porarily the  problem  of  overproduction  for  the  capitalist,  it 
does  so  only  by  bringing  up  a  future  unemployed  problem 
for  the  workingman. 


Why  A  Workingman  Should  Be  A  Socialist     19 

Overproduction,  as  we  have  seen,  is  caused  by  the  com- 
petitive system  preventing  the  workingmen  demanding 
enough  wages  to  buy  the  goods  that  they  themselves  have 
produced.  To  prevent  overproduction  the  competitive  system 
must  be  abolished  and  a  new  system  substituted  which  will 
allow  the  workers  to  consume  what  they  produce.  This  new 
system  is  co-operation,  the  inauguration  of  which  would  mean 
that  the  workers  would  receive  wealth  according  as  they  pro- 
duced it,  instead  of  upon  the  present  basis  of  allowing  them 
the  bare  necessities  of  life. 

On  the  other  hand,  it  is  evident  that  if  the  workers  take 
all  they  produce  there  will  be  nothing  left  for  the  capitalists. 
Hence  there  will  be  no  incentive  to  own  property  privately, 
for  there  will  be  no  profit,  no  rent,  no  interest.  The  aboli- 
tion of  the  profit  system,  in  fact,  means  practically  the  end  of 
the  system  of  private  ownership  of  capital,  as  it  likewise 
means  the  inauguration  of  the  system  of  public,  or  govern- 
ment, ownership  of  trusts  and  monopolies — or,  in  short,  of 
all  capital. 

Socialism  means  the  co-operative  or  government  owner- 
ship and  management  of  capital,  and  the  co-operative  distri- 
bution of  the  product  to  the  workers,  and  by  workers  we  in- 
clude the  brain-worker  as  well  as  the  hand-worker.  Socialism 
means  industrial  democracy.  We  now  live  under  an  indus- 
trial autocracy,  with  King  Eockefeller  as  our  industrial  ruler, 
just  as  before  1776  we  lived  under  a  political  autocracy  with 
King  George  of  England  as  our  political  ruler.  But  the  rea- 
sons which  led  America  to  achieve  political  democracy  are 
not  nearly  as  strong  as  those  which  are  now  about  to  force  her 
to  achieve  industrial  democracy. 

Public  ownership  of  monopolies,  or  Socialism,  is  an  inevit- 
ability because  it  affords  the  only  possible  solution  for  the 
distribution  of  commodities  when  the  machinery  of  produc- 
tion finally  develops  beyond  the  control  of  the  capitalists. 
This  stage  in  the  evolution  of  industry  is  now  upon  us.  The 
Trust  is  the  significant  sign  of  the  impending  collapse  of 
capitalism.  ~ — — ; — — 

The  Trust  is  not  only  a  protection  against  competition, 
but  is  also  a  labor-saving  machine,  effecting  tremendous  econ- 
omies in  production.  Just  as  the  manual  laborers  of  fifty 
years  ago  tried  to  destroy  the  first  machines  which  threatened 


20  Socialism  Inevitable 

to  displace  them,  so  we  see  a  like  ineffectual  clamor  voiced 
equally  by  both  Mr.  Bryan  and  Mr.  Roosevelt,  from  the 
smaller  capitalists  of  to-day  against  their  inevitable  displace- 
ment by  the  trust  magnates.  But  monopoly  is  the  future 
determining  factor  in  production,  and  competition  is  forever 
dethroned.  Already  we  see  each  of  our  great  industries  con- 
trolled by  one  corporation  and  headed  by  one  man — a  "cap- 
tain of  industry*' — and  this  state  of  affairs  is  what  more  than 
anything  else  demonstrates  the  practicability  of  Socialism. 
Certainly  if  a  Gould  can  successfully  manage  the  telegraphs 
of  the  country,  there  can  be  no  difficulty  in  the  government 
doing  the  same  thing.  If  Mr.  Rockefeller,  moreover,  can 
manage  the  oil  business,  Mr.  Vanderbilt  the  railways,  Mr. 
Armour  the  beef  business,  Mr.  Pillsbury  the  flour  business, 
Mr.  Carnegie  the  iron  business,  Mr.  Havemeyer  the  sugar 
business,  Mr.  Frick  the  coal  business,  and  Mr.  Astor  our  land; 
— we  say,  if  individual  capitalists  can  manage  these  proper- 
ties for  their  own  selfish  ends,  that  we,  the  people,  can  just 
as  well  manage  them  for  our  own  use  and  benefit. 

Capitalism  in  its  death  throes  tries  every  means  to  sustain 
prices  at  a  profitable  basis  against  the  constantly  growing 
menace  of  overproduction.  To  this  end  while  it  adopts  the 
Trust  at  home,  as  a  means  of  restricting  domestic  production, 
on  the  other  hand,  it  institutes  a  policy  of  "Imperialism'' 
abroad  as  a  means  of  increasing  foreign  consumption.  Hence 
we  see  that  both  Trusts  and  "Imperialism'*  work  hand  in 
glove,  and  are  simply  the  results  of  a  vain  struggle  to  main- 
tain falling  prices. 

All  the  foregoing  is  pretty  plain  talk,  and  should  not  be 
easily  misunderstood.  Some,  however,  while  following  the 
argument  that  (1)  wages  cannot,  under  the  competitive  wage 
system,  rise  above  the  subsistence  point,  no  matter  how  pro- 
ductive labor  may  become;  (2)  that  this  curtailment  of  con- 
sumption must  result  in  overproduction;  (3)  that  next  is  the 
Trust,  and  (4)  that  the  Trust  must  be  followed  by  (5)  the 
great  unemployed  problem; — here  they  may  stop  without 
seeing  the  end  of  the  whole  matter  in  (6)  the  final,  public 
ownership  of  the  Trusts  and  other  machinery  of  production 
— Socialism. 

Of  course,  it  must  strike  everyone  as  absurd  that  people 
cannot  get  enough  to  eat  because  they  produce  too  much,  and 


Why  A  Workingman  Should  Be  A  Socialist     21 

yet  everyone  realizes  that  a  laborer  cannot  eat  if  he  doesn't 
earn  any  wages  with  which  to  buy  food.  It  is  also  plain  that 
a  laborer  cannot  get  a  job  of  the  baker  to  make  bread,  if  the 
baker  already  has  baked  more  bread  than  he  can  sell.  It  is 
likewise  evident  that  if  the  laborer  were  his  own  baker  he 
would  not  starve  when  it  is  his  own  oven  that  is  full  of  bread. 

Now  this  is  simply  the  Socialist  argument.  We  say  that 
this  country  of  ours,  America,  is  like  a  grand  bake-oven  filled 
with  bread,  and  cake,  too,  for  that  matter; — that  the  head 
baker  of  the  national  oven,  Mr.  Kockefeller,  can't  hire  us  to 
bake  bread  because  he  can't  sell  us  the  bread  we  have  made, 
but  that  this  is  no  reason  why  we  should  starve  when  all  we 
have  to  do  is  to  take  over  the  bakery  and  feed  ourselves  with 
our  own  baking. 

And  there  really  would  be  no  opposition  from  Rockefeller 
to  our  taking  the  business  off  his  hands  so  long  as  we  took  it 
for  ourselves  and  let  him  have  his  share  along  with  us. 
Rockefeller  is  not  necessarily  such  a  selfish  fellow,  but  he 
naturally  would  object  if  he  thought  we  were  going  to  take 
the  national  bakery — otherwise  our  own  country — away  from 
him  in  order  to  give  it  to  Carnegie  or  Vanderbilt,  the  very 
men  from  whom  he  has  just  wrested  it.  The  opposition  to 
Socialism,  in  fact,  isn't  from  Rockefeller,  but  from  the  stu- 
pidity and  apathy  of  the  very  people  most  to  be  benefited 
by  it,  from  the  workingmen  themselves. 

All  we  have  to  do  in  order  to  own  our  own  country  is  for 
a  majority  to  vote  for  the  Socialist  Party,  the  only  party  that 
is  pledged  to  carry  out  that  idea.  With  the  success  of  that 
party  and  the  change  that  it  would  bring  about,  no  one  need 
work  more  than  three  hours  a  day,  and  everyone  who  wanted 
to  work  could  find  it,  receiving  in  return  the  full  fruits  of 
his  labor.  Everyone  would  have  leisure;  children  would  be 
educated;  all  would  be  free,  and  happiness  would  reign 
supreme. 

Workingmen,  you  now  know  the  road  to  freedom.  When 
you  pursue  that  path  you  will  be  free— before  that,  never! 


32  Socialism:  Inevitable 


SALUTATORY 

(December,    1900.) 

TEE  Challenge  has  been  brought  into  life  in  order  to 
voice  for  this  community  certain  thoughts  and  ideas 
of  a  radical  nature  that  are  either  altogether  avoided 
in  the  daily  press,  or  are  published  in  so  desultory  a  manner 
that  those  in  sympathy  with  such  thought  are  wholly  unable 
to  follow  its  development. 

The  founder  of  this  paper  thinks  that  a  crisis  in  the  po- 
litical and  industrial  history  of  the  United  States  is  rapidly 
approaching,  and  that  it  is  of  the  utmost  importance  for 
the  people  to  be  informed  of  this  fact.  Society  is  an  organ- 
ism, and  is  governed  by  the  same  evolutionary  laws  that  con- 
trol all  other  organisms.  It  will  be  the  mission  of  The  Chal- 
lenge to  expound  these  laws. 

Certain  people  who  regard  themselves  as  scientific  are 
ready  enough  to  admit  an  inevitable  evolution  in  the  form 
of  human  society,  but  say  that  nature  moves  so  slowly  that 
it  will  take  thousands  of  years  before  we  can  expect  any  ap- 
preciable change. 

The  Challenge  considers  such  views  as  essentially  superficial. 
There  is  a  critical  point  in  all  natural  movements.  Hydro- 
gen and  oxygen,  if  mixed  in  exact  proportions  of  two  to  one 
and  brought  into  contact  with  an  electric  spark,  will  explode 
and  form  water.  When  water  is  heated  to  212  degrees  it 
boils  and  becomes  steam.  After  the  hen  sits  on  her  eggs  three 
weeks  they  are  hatched  into  chickens.  Apparently  in  each 
of  these  cases  there  was  no  outward  change  until  the  critical 
point  was  reached,  whereupon  there  was  a  sudden  transforma- 
tion. We  believe  that  society  is  approaching  its  critical  point, 
and  that  a  transformation  must  ensue.  We  can  compare 
the  present  competitive  system,  embracing  the  private  owner- 
ship of  capital,  to  a  shell  which  protects  the  formation  of  a 
new  and  better  society  within  itself.  When  this  new  society 
is  ready  it  will  simply  burst  its  shell  and  step  forth,  fully 
formed  and  complete. 


Salutoky  23 

With  such  ideas  it  will  necessarily  be  seen  that  The  Chal- 
lenge can  hardly  be  classed  under  the  head  of  "reform" 
journals.  A  "reform"  paper  is  one  that  hopes  to  improve 
our  present  society,  and  usually  advocates  putting  honest 
men  into  office  to  secure  this  betterment.  The  Challenge 
has  very  little  sympathy  with  such  views.  It  is  true  that 
we  want  honest  men  in  public  life,  but  we  also  want  them 
in  private  life,  and  are  rather  inclined  to  think  that  honesty 
in  private  life  is  to-day  of  more  importance  to  society  than 
in  public  life.  We  look  upon  the  existing  form  of  society 
as  we  would  look  at  an  old  coat  about  to  be  discarded.  It 
is  hardly  worth  patching,  and  yet  as  the  time  for  changing 
to  a  new  coat  is  not  absolutely  determined,  one  feels  that 
both  decency  and  comfort  demand  that  the  old  one  be 
kept  in  as  good  order  as  possible  until  the  other  is  actually 
ready.  But  it  would  be  folly  to  spend  all  one's  energies  in 
the  repairing  process,  and  so  delay  the  completion  of  a  newer 
and  infinitely  better  garment. 

We  think  that  the  Trust  is  the  significant  sign  of  the  ap- 
proaching completion  of  this  new  social  coat;  and  we  have 
no  fault  to  find  with  it  for  sending  us  this  message.  To 
attempt  to  destroy  the  Trust  is  as  absurd  as  to  batter  up 
one's  office  telephone  because  it  conveys  unwelcome  news. 
All  innovations,  no  matter  how  good  they  may  be,  are  usually 
rejected  when  first  proposed,  owing  to  the  innate  conserv- 
atism of  mankind.  The  opposition  which  greeted  the  intro- 
duction of  railways  in  England  from  the  educated  country 
gentlemen,  the  cream  of  the  nation,  was  almost  as  great  as 
that  exhibited  to-day  by  the  Chinese  Boxers  against  the  in- 
troduction of  railways  in  China.  The  Trust  is  unwelcome 
to  many  of  us  simply  because  we  are  of  the  conservative 
"Boxer"  temperament,  and  dislike  all  innovations  upon  gen- 
eral principles.  But  trusts  are  the  most  remarkable  labor- 
saving  device  ever  perfected  by  the  mind  of  man,  and  no 
doubt  inspire  jealousy,  since  they  are  so  costly  that  very  few 
can  afford  to  own  one. 

We  can  imagine  a  newspaper  man  opposing  linotypes,  not 
because  they  are  bad  in  themselves,  but  because  he  is  too  poor 
to  buy  one,  and  so  finds  himself  distanced  by  his  competitors. 
He  will  say  that  there  will  no  longer  be  a  free  press  when 


24  Socialism  Inevitable 

it  requires  a  man  of  money  rather  than  of  brains  to  establish 
a  paper. 

The  small  business  man  has  long  been  crying  out  against 
corporations  on  the  same  ground,  viz.,  that  plenty  of  capital 
is  more  of  a  requisite  for  success  than  brains.  And  the 
Trust  not  only  accentuates  this  view,  but  has  brought  him 
to  see  that  where  it  was  formerly  difficult  for  the  man  without 
money  to  establish  himself,  now  it  is  absolutely  impossible. 

Business  to-day  has  assumed  the  monarchial  form.  Any 
native  American  may  be  the  President  of  the  United  States, 
or  at  least,  birth  is  not  a  barrier;  but  a  man  has  no  more 
chance  of  being  the  president  of  the  Standard  Oil  Trust  than 
he  has  of  being  called  to  the  throne  of  England.  And  it  is 
not  so  much  that  the  chance  of  advancement  ceases  with  the 
advent  of  the  Trust.  Not  only  does  the  Trust  prevent  ad- 
vancement, but  it  insists  upon  outsiders  retiring  altogether 
from  the  field.  Now,  if  a  man  could  hold  his  own  he  might 
consent  to  lose  his  ambition,  but  when  he  finds  his  very 
livelihood  threatened,  he  is  forced  into  active  opposition.  At 
present  it  is  principally  the  small  business  men  and  jobbers  who 
are  opposed  to  the  Trust.  They  wish  it  destroyed,  and  hope  for 
a  return  to  the  old  days  of  free  competition.  Being  mostly 
men  of  commercial  training,  however,  the  simple  business 
arguments  in  favor  of  the  formation  and  perpetuation  of 
the  Trust  have  proved  so  convincing  that  they  are  ceasing  to 
protest  against  the  inevitable. 

Workingmen  will  be  the  next  to  feel  the  results  of  the 
economies  effected  by  the  Trust.  At  present,  owing  to  the 
industrial  boom  in  progress,  the  trusts  are  pushed  to  their 
utmost  to  fill  orders;  hence,  notwithstanding  the  economies 
effected  by  concentration,  there  is  no  diminution  in  the  de- 
mand for  labor.  The  result  has  simply  been  a  larger  product 
with  the  same  number  of  employees,  a  condition  of  affairs, 
however,  that  will  last  only  as  long  as  times  are  good.  As 
soon  as  the  boom  is  over  the  trusts  will  be  compelled  to 
discharge  unnecessary  workers,  who  will  immediately  join 
in  the  anti-Trust  clamor.  They  will  act  the  part  of  the  dog 
biting  a  stone  that  hit  him  instead  of  going  after  the  man 
who  threw  it.  To-day,  however,  workingmen,  as  a  class, 
are  rather  favorably  disposed  to  the  Trust.  It  has  apparently 
given  them  more  employment,  and  it  certainly  has  given 


Salutory  25 

them  steadier  employment.  But  let  this  condition  once 
change,  as  change  it  must,  and  there  will  no  longer  be  a 
McKinley  carried  triumphantly  to  the  presidential  chair. 

The  Eepublicans  played  their  trump  card  when  they  asked 
to  be  returned  to  power  because  they  had  made  business  good, 
and  at  the  same  time  promised  that  they  would  continue  such 
good  times  in  the  future.  They  have,  in  fact,  frankly  ac- 
cepted the  onus  of  any  bad  times  that  the  future  may  bring, 
and  that  bad  times  lie  ahead  is  as  sure  as  fate.  Then  will 
the  Eepublicans  be  called  to  their  accounting. 

Now,  will  the  people  be  so  foolish  as  to  return  the  Demo- 
crats to  power  simply  upon  a  program  of  negation?  We 
think  not.  We  believe  that  the  political  party  of  the  future, 
if  it  is  to  be  successful,  must  have  an  intelligent  constructive 
program. 


26  Socialism  Inevitable 


THE  OLD  LADY'S  AILMENT 

(April  17,  1 90 1.) 

THE  United  States,  almost  in  the  throes  of  giving  birth 
to  a  new  social  system,  is  in  a  pitiful  yet  amusing 
plight.  Indeed,  we  might  be  compared  to  an  old 
woman  who  has  all  sorts  of  pains,  and  a  number  of  quacks 
prescribing  for  her.  She  is  a  foolish  old  thing  without  sense 
enough  to  know  the  difference  between  a  quack  and  a  real 
physician,  and  so  does  not  yet  dare  to  make  her  choice.  The 
quacks  tell  her  she  has  a  variety  of  diseases,  and  try  to  force 
all  kinds  of  absurd  remedies  down  her  throat.  She,  herself, 
does  not  know  exactly  what  ails  her,  but  is  beginning  to  see 
that  the  quacks  are  really  no  wiser,  although  she  takes  some 
of  their  medicine  from  time  to  time  to  get  rid  of  them. 

She  also  hears,  with  wondering  delight  and  surprise,  the 
theory  of  the  Socialist  as  to  the  cause  of  her  ill-health;  but 
she  thinks  he  must  be  a  base  flatterer.  How  could  a  miser- 
able, selfish,  ugly  old  thing,  ever  believe  that  she  could  be 
so  delicately  indisposed  ?  She  admits  that  she  rather  likes  the 
idea,  but  resolutely  refuses  belief.  "The  Trust,  my  dear 
madam,"  says  the  Socialist,  whenever  he  gets  a  chance  at 
her  ear  between  so  many  consultants,  "signifies  that  you  are 
about  to  give  birth  to  Socialism."  "No,  no,"  cries  one  of 
the  quacks;  "nothing  of  the  sort:  the  Trust  is  a  dangerous 
foreign  growth,  a  tumor,  that  should  be  destroyed  before  it 
grows  bigger  and  kills  the  patient."  Then  another  quack 
steps  up,  elbowing  the  first  one  aside,  and  says,  "Don't  listen 
to  him,  madam;  he  would  destroy  your  life.  The  Trust  is 
now  too  large  a  body  to  be  removed  without  causing  your 
death.  Let  it  alone  and  it  will  gradually  pass  away  of  itself. 
It  will  die  a  natural  death."  "But,"  says  the  patient,  "that 
is  just  what  you  have  been  telling  me  for  fifteen  years,  and 
I  am  growing  worse  and  worse,  and  the  Trust  bigger  every 
year.    Why,  it  actually  seems  to  be  getting  bigger  than  I  am." 

"Ah,  dear  madam,  that  is  all  in  the  course  of  nature;  and 


The  Old  Lady's  Ailment  27 

anyway  it  is  rather  an  ornament,  besides  being  extremely 
useful.  Don't  be  alarmed;  you  would  not  know  what  to  do 
without  it.  What  would  become  of  all  your  life's  blood  if 
it  did  not  go  to  feed  the  tumor  ?  You  would  die  of  apoplexy. 
You  would  wear  yourself  out  with  natural  exuberance  if 
you  should  rid  yourself  of  it.  It  gives  steady  employment 
to  all  your  natural  functions.  Your  heart,  your  lungs,  even 
your  brains,  are  all  now  well  employed  keeping  this  tumor 
in  vigorous  health.  If  you  should  lose  it  your  heart  would 
have  only  half-time  work  demanded  of  it,  and  it  might 
stop  beating  altogether.  I  really  think  at  times,  madam, 
that  this  tumor,  which  you  are  pleased  to  call  a  'foreign 
growth/  is  quite  as  important  as  jour  own  life.  You  have 
burdened  yourself  so  long  with  it  that  you  are  no  longer 
beautiful  and  strong  as  you  were  when  you  were  young 
and  healthy,  and  I  don't  think  your  life  worth  so  very  much, 
anyway.  In  fact,  the  only  reason  I  can  see  for  your  living 
at  all  is  to  keep  the  tumor  alive." 

The  old  woman,  of  course,  is  rather  shocked  at  such  a 
frank  statement  from  the  doctor;  but  he  is  the  old  family 
physician,  and  she  is  so  ill  that  she  has  lost  the  courage  to 
discharge  him.  The  Socialist  doctor,  however,  is  persistent 
in  whispering  to  her  the  real  meaning  of  her  pains,  and  while 
she  does  not  take  his  advice  in  discharging  her  quacks,  she 
at  any  rate  commences  to  do  some  thinking  on  her  own  ac- 
count. Meanwhile,  every  day  makes  her  condition  more  and 
more  critical,  which,  strange  to  say,  seems  to  corroborate 
both  the  theory  of  the  quack  and  that  of  the  Socialist.  The 
Trust  tumor,  in  fact,  seems  now  an  inseparable  part  of  the 
body;  yet  it  makes  a  correspondingly  heavy  drain  upon  the 
resources  of  a  physique  less  and  less  able  to  bear  the  strain. 
However,  in  such  ambiguous  cases  a  true  diagnosis  is  but 
a  question  of  time;  and  in  this  particular  case  the  Socialist 
doctor  knows  that  the  time  is  rapidly  approaching  when  the 
patient  will  determine  for  herself  what  ails  her.    Selah. 


28  Socialism  Inevitable 


CAPITALISM  BREEDS  NO  HORATIUS 

(May  15,   1901.) 

MY  experience  with  men  has  taught  me  that  in  regard 
to  the  fundamental  realities  of  life  they  display 
little  difference  that  is  traceable  to  education  or  en- 
vironment. Given  certain  situations,  men  will  act  very  much 
alike,  no  matter  what  their  condition  of  life.  If  a  vessel  is 
stranded  on  a  lone  island  in  the  Pacific  ocean,  and  the  sur- 
vivors have  every  reason  to  believe  that  their  stay  may  be 
indefinitely  prolonged,  then  all  will  set  to  work  together  to 
provide  the  necessities  of  life  in  very  much  the  same  way, 
and  with  little  reference  to  their  previous  social  or  economic 
condition.  The  rich  and  the  poor,  men,  women  and  children, 
all  will  do  their  share ;  and  if  there  are  any  shirks  they  are 
as  likely  to  be  among  those  who  were  formerly  rich  as  among 
the  poor. 

To-day  if  a  poor  man  unexpectedly  falls  heir  to  a  fortune, 
he  likewise  falls  into  the  ways  of  the  rich  in  living  a  life  of 
idleness,  notwithstanding  the  fact  that  before  his  windfall 
his  life  may  have  been  one  of  most  strenuous  exertion.  Men 
first  do  what  they  must;  secondly,  if  it  be  possible,  they  do 
what  they  like.  The  poor  man  must  do  almost  everything  he 
does;  the  rich  man  has  practically  nothing  he  must  do  in 
life  except  perform  certain  natural  functions. 

I  say  all  this  because  some  people  seem  to  think  that  when 
a  man  is  rich,  he  must  necessarily  be  a  very  different  sort 
of  animal  to  the  rest  of  us.  Some  people,  moreover,  who  are 
poor,  either  in  spirit,  health  or  wealth,  and  for  one  or  all 
of  these  reasons  are  unable  to  enjoy  life  after  the  manner  of 
their  more  fortunate  brothers,  are  often  inclined  to  flatter 
themselves  that  this  is  an  evidence  of  superior  virtue  on  their 
part.  They  are  like  the  wicked  old  lady  who  prided  herself 
on  forsaking  vice,  when  in  reality  vice  had  forsaken  her. 

When  one  is  aboard  ship  and  sea  sick,  it  is  very  easy  to  be 
abstemious,  and  it  is  also  very  natural  to  look  with  great 


Capitalism  Breeds  No  Horatius  29 

disgust  at  the  gross  materialism  of  some  old  sea  dog  who 
prides  himself  on  never  missing  a  meal.  There  are  any 
amount  of  men  who  don't  drink  whiskey  simply  because  their 
livers  won't  allow  them  to,  and  such  men  are  not  unusually 
the  ones  who  parade  their  enforced  abstemiousness  as  a  great 
virtue,  and  will  sometimes  join  others  to  secure  legislation 
preventing  the  consumption  of  whiskey.  I  am  not  intimtaing 
by  this  remark  that  the  possession  of  a  disordered  liver  is  the 
necessary  equipment  of  a  thorough-going  Prohibitionist,  as 
I  readily  admit  that  most  Prohibitionists  have  healthy  livers; 
but  I  must  say  that  most  of  the  men  I  have  known  who  like 
whiskey  have  certain  fundamental  differences  in  physique 
from  those  who  do  not,  and  that  this  difference  is  inherited 
and  not  acquired. 

All  the  foregoing  is  important  as  indicating  how  the  rich 
are  going  to  act  when  the  time  shall  arrive  for  the  transfer 
of  their  wealth  to  the  nation.  The  only  way  for  a  poor  man 
to  determine  how  he  will  act  is  to  put  himself  in  the  boots 
of  a  rich  man,  and  imagine  that  the  revolution  is  at  hand. 

Most  people  who  have  never  had  money  think  that  rich 
men  enjoy  one  grand  round  of  pleasure,  whereas,  as  a  matter 
of  fact,  most  of  them  regard  life  as  a  decided  bore.  Particu- 
larly is  this  true  of  the  rich  American  whose  whole  life  is 
artificial.  He  has  no  friends,  in  the  true  sense  of  the  word, 
and  travel,  which  seems  a  wonderful  and  never-ending  source 
of  amusement  to  those  who  cannot  afford  it,  soon  loses  its 
charm  when  long  pursued.  In  short,  he  makes  a  business  of 
pleasure,  and  loses  the  very  end  he  aims  at. 

The  pursuit  of  art,  of  course,  is  too  tedious,  and  involves 
too  much  hard  work,  to  attract  many  of  the  rich ;  and  unless 
one  gives  it  the  labor  it  demands,  its  real  charms  are  with- 
held. Indeed  the  rich  man  who  gives  his  life  to  art  is  almost 
unknown. 

But  domestic  life  is  equally  disappointing ;  even  his  pleasure 
in  his  children  being  marred  by  the  inevitable  frivolity  of 
the  daughters,  and  the  dissipation  of  the  sons.  A  man's 
pride  in  life  is  to  have  a  noble  son.  Tell  me,  however,  the 
rich  men  of  America  who  have  sons  that  really  gratify  that 
pride.  The  rich  read  the  same  classical  literature  that  is 
the  common  heritage  of  us  all.     "Horatius  on  the  Bridge" 


30  Socialism  Inevitable 

is  quite  as  popular  with  the  Rockefellers  and  Vanderbilts  as 
he  is  in  any  poor  family.  Regulus  is  not  the  private  hero  of 
a  class.  All  the  heroes  of  history,  indeed,  are  just  as  much 
the  heritage  of  the  rich  as  of  the  poor,  and  the  failure  of  an 
Astor  or  a  Morgan  to  see  any  traits  of  the  hero  in  his  son 
makes  him  feel  that  he  has  lost  just  that  much  of  the  pos- 
sibilities of  life. 

Now  I  don't  think  that  Mr.  Pierpont  Morgan  spends  many 
days  in  regretting  that  conditions  prevent  young  Ponty  being 
a  modern  Horatius,  but,  nevertheless,  the  fact  that  young 
Ponty  knows  this,  to  that  very  extent  weakens  the  idea  that 
either  old  or  young  Pont  will  spend  much  time  at  any  bridge 
holding  back  the  great  army  of  disinherited  Americans  when 
they  come  marching  along  to  claim  their  own.  In  the  first 
place,  neither  of  the  Ponts  will  think  there  is  much  worth 

fighting  for,  and  besides,  they  will  say,  they'll  be  d d  if 

they  see  any  use  in  fighting  for  a  lot  of  Rockefellers,  Astors 
and  Vanderbilts.  When  Horatius  battled  at  the  bridge,  not 
only  was  he  a  hero,  but  he  was  of  a  race  of  heroes,  and  was 
fighting  for  heroes.  There  were  plenty  of  his  kind  in  those 
days :  conditions  bred  them.  The  every-day  life  of  the  Roman 
was  to  exercise  at  arms  and  imagine  himself  a  hero,  and  in 
just  such  a  position  as  Horatius  actually  found  himself. 
Now,  old  Ponty  never  thinks  of  such  a  life  for  himself  or 
for  young  Pont.  They  fight  battles  at  the  Stock  Exchange, 
it  is  true,  but  that's  hardly  the  same  thing  as  the  Horatius 
kind  of  fighting. 

Men  do  not  change,  but  conditions  do.  The  Morgans  and 
Vanderbilts,  having  nothing  to  fight  for,  lack  both  the  desire 
to  fight  and  any  loyal  friends  to  fight  for  them.  Some  of 
my  enthusiastic  comrades  who  look  for  rivers  of  blood  when 
Uncle  Sam  and  Uncle  Ponty  swap  railroads  and  trusts,  may 
exhibit  courage  by  making  up  their  minds  for  battle,  but 
they  are  exercising  their  imaginations  more  than  their  reason. 
There  is  no  man  who  will  know  quicker  when  to  lay  down 
than  either  J.  Pierpont  Morgan  or  John  D.  Rockefeller. 
They  are  unbeaten  generals,  because  they  have  never  under- 
estimated their  antagonists.  When  Carnegie  saw  what  he 
was  up  against  he  threw  down  his  cards  without  a  murmur. 
Rockefeller  took  the  pot  and  gave  Carnegie  his  I.  0.  U. — two 


Capitalism  Breeds  No  Horatius  31 

hundred  million  five  per  cent,  bonds.  And  Uncle  Sam  will 
do  the  same  thing  to  Rockefeller  that  he  himself  has  done 
to  Carnegie.  1  won't  say  what  kind  of  an  I.  0.  U.  Uncle 
Sam  will  issue  to  Ponty.  Rocky  &  Co.,  but  I  will  bet  my 
hat  when  it  comes  to  a  show-down  that  there  won't  be  any 
scrapping  over  the  terms. 


32  Socialism  Inevitable 


A  PSYCHOLOGICAL  PROBLEM 

(March,   1902.) 

THE  claim  of  the  inevitability  of  Socialism  places  it 
upon  a  somewhat  different  plane  than  that  of  any  other 
economic  doctrine.  No  protectionist  ever  claims  that 
"protection"  is  the  result  of  industrial  evolution,  and  that 
hence  all  the  world  must  adopt  it.  No  "single-tax"  man 
thinks  that  his  plan  of  taxation  will  come  about  as  a  natural 
process  of  human  thought. 

This  insistence  of  the  inevitability  of  Socialism  by  Social- 
ists often  gives  rise  to  the  query,  which  is  seen  in  the  follow- 
ing letter: — 

Boston,  Mass.,  Oct.  21,  1901. 
22  Worcester  Sq. 
Gaylord  Wilshire,  Esq. 

Dear  Sir:— I  attended  the  lecture  given  by  you  last  evening 
(Oct.  20),  in  Paine  Memorial,  by  invitation  of  a  friend  of  mine. 
I  have  belonged  to  the  Democratic  party,  but  am  now  very  much 
interested  in  Socialism.  There  was  a  statement,  if  I  remember, 
made  by  you,  in  the  course  of  your  lecture,  that  Socialism  was 
inevitable — something  which  the  laws  of  nature  would  force 
to  come  to  pass.  Now,  if  you  really  think  so,  "why  not  let 
things  take  their  course?  The  ultimate  result  will  be  the  same?" 
By  way  of  explanation  I  will  say  that  I  don't  ask  you  this  ques- 
tion for  the  purpose  of  "sticking"  you,  as  the  small  boy  says, 
but  as  a  matter  of  information  for  myself  and  others  who  are 
interested  in  the  movement.  Hoping  you  will  oblige  by  answer- 
ing this  question,  I  am, 

Yours  sincerely, 

Thos-  J.  Smith- 

This  is  at  base  a  problem  in  psychology.  If  you  wish  a 
man  to  perform  a  task,  is  he  more  likely  to  do  it  if  you  tell 
him  beforehand  that  it  will  be  very  easy,  or  if  you  tell  him 
it  will  be  extremely  difficult,  perhaps  impossible? 

Of  course,  there  can  be  but  one  answer.    The  easier  a  de- 


A  Psychological  Problem  33 

sirable  thing  is  to  acquire,  the  more  likely  is  the  man  to 
attempt  it. 

The  baby  wants  the  moon  and  reaches  for  it  until  he  grows 
old  enough  to  learn  he  cannot  get  it.  Then  he  tries  for  the 
earth,  and  finds  that  Morgan  has  been  there  first.  It  is,  of 
course,  true  that  if  I  think  my  breakfast  is  going  to  fall 
down  from  heaven  whenever  I  wish  it,  and  exactly  in  the 
form,  place  and  time  that  I  wish  it,  then  it  might  appear 
that  I  will  not  be  likely  to  work  for  it.  However,  we  do  know 
that  as  a  matter  of  fact  the  rich  man  will  spend  long  hours 
of  the  most  arduous  labor  stalking  deer,  or  killing  salmon, 
when  no  motive  of  the  knowledge  that  he  will  go  hungry 
unless  he  does  such  work,  can  be  alleged.  He  simply  obeys 
a  natural  and  irresistible  instinct  to  work  for  his  living,  not- 
withstanding that  he  is  under  no  necessity  of  doing  so. 

Man's  pleasure  in  life  is  the  exercise  of  his  activities,  and 
inasmuch  as  the  problem  of  getting  food  has  for  so  many 
thousands  of  years  been  his  greatest  stimulus  to  activity  he 
cannot  resist  continuing  in  that  mode  of  action,  even  when 
the  immediate  stimulus  is  withdrawn.  He  acts  simply  from 
the  momentum  gained  through  his  forefathers.  The  very 
phrase,  "pleasures  of  the  chase"  shows  the  imperative  nature 
of  this  call  to  the  rich. 

Now,  it  is  evident  that  there  would  be  no  fun  hunting  deer 
if  you  knew  positively  that  there  were  no  deer  in  the  forest. 
So  with  Socialism.  The  reason  we  want  it  is  not  only  be- 
cause we  think  that  it  will  benefit  humanity,  but  also  because 
we  think  we  can  get  it.  Take  either  one  of  these  factors 
away  and  we  would  never  struggle  for  it.  The  nearer  at  hand 
it  is  the  more  we  will  struggle  for  it.  It  is  notorious  that 
those  men  who  have  the  clearest  conception  of  the  economic 
inevitability  of  Socialism  are  always  the  most  persistent 
workers  for  it. 

For  instance,  there  has  never  been  a  man  in  England  that 
has  devoted  so  much  of  his  life  to  Socialism  as  Hyndman, 
yet  he  himself  always  declares  that  it  is  his  knowledge  of  the 
inevitability  of  the  advent  of  Socialism  in  a  comparatively 
short  period  of  time  that  keeps  him  active  in  the  movement. 
I  myself  have  probably  always  been,  and  am  yet,  the  most 
optimistic  man  in  the  whole  Socialist  movement.  Since  the 
time  I  became  a  Socialist  I  have  never  placed  the  social  rev- 


34  Socialism  Inevitable 

olution  away  over  five  years,  and  the  mere  fact  that  it  has 
never  come  off  according  to  my  predictions  has  never  daunted 
me.  I  am  still  a  "five  year  man,  with  a  possibility  of  three," 
and  I  will  never  be  anything  else.  If  I  had  to  be  in  "the  hun- 
dred year,  one-step-at-a-time,  take-what-you-can-get"  class, 
you  would  find  me  automobiling  my  life  away  down  at  New- 
port with  Eeggie  Vanderbilt  instead  of  editing  this  maga- 
zine. There  is  nothing  of  the  Salvation  Army  stuff  about 
me — preaching  to  save  a  man's  life  after  he  is  dead.  Nor 
is  there  anything  of  the  Seth  Low- Jerome  business  either — 
grubbing  away  trying  to  reform  the  Crokers,  Platts  and  Dev- 
erys.  That  sort  of  thing  may  amuse  Jacob  A.  Riis,  and  Carl 
Schurz,  and  President  Eoosevelt,  but  it  has  no  attractions 
for  me.  As  said,  I  would  rather  chase  down  the  pike  on  my 
Red  Dragon  at  'steen  hundred  miles  an  hour,  terrifying  the 
farmers,  than  go  in  for  any  "reform  game." 

Socialism  is  the  only  game  that  amuses  me,  and  humanity 
the  only  stake  worth  my  while  wasting  my  time  playing  for. 
Let  the  Schwabs  go  in  for  Monte  Carlo  if  they  will.  They 
are  fools  to  be  ignorant  of  what  America  can  furnish  in  the 
way  of  sport  with  its  Maddens  and  Roosevelts.  I  will  take 
my  chances  on  a  man  working  for  Socialism  if  I  can  shove 
the  economics  into  him  far  enough,  while  I  won't  give  a  cent 
for  a  man  who  will  only  get  along  far  enough  to  admit  that 
it  is  a  "good  thing."  He  must  not  only  see  that  it  is  "good," 
but  that  it  is  "coming."  Show  me  a  man  who  is  a  Marxian 
in  economics,  and  who  knows  the  extent  of  our  industrial 
evolution — who  understands  the  significance  of  the  trust,  and 
I  will  show  you  a  good  Socialist.  I  am  not  afraid  that  such 
a  man  will  not  work  for  the  cause  simply  because  he  thinks 
it  will  come  anyway. 

Socialism  will  not  come  without  our  working  for  it  any 
more  than  the  egg  would  be  hatched  unless  the  chick  worked 
itself  out  of  its  shell.  However,  the  chick,  we  know,  will 
work  itself  out  at  the  proper  time,  because  we  know  it  must 
obey  an  irresistible  instinct. 

The  same  with  humanity,  when  it  is  ready  to  be  hatched 
from  the  shell  of  capitalism  into  the  new  life  of  Socialism 
it  will  instinctively  work  its  own  salvation.  Humanity  will 
struggle  to  free  itself  from  the  shell,  simply  because  it  can- 
not help  obeying  the  irresistible  instinct  of  self-preservation, 


A  Psychological  Problem  35 

which  is  just  as  strong  a  social  instinct  as  it  is  an  individual 
instinct. 

It  is  quite  true  that  the  particular  class  o£~humanity  which 
will  bear  the  brunt  of  the  struggle  will  be  the  working-class, 
and  it  is  to  that  class  we  must  look  for  .the  great  organiza- 
tion whicn  is  to  forrn~frbrn  the  result  of  the  industrial  evolu- 
tion. Again  referring  back  to  the  chick. breaking  out  of  its 
shell,  we  may  think  the  bill  or  the  legs  have  more  to  do  with 
the  breaking  out  than  the  feathers  or  the  lungs,  but  we  know 
that  back  of  all  the  struggle  is  the  nervous  organization,  the 
brain,  which  must  first  be  formed  before  any  concerted  action 
can  take  place.  So  it  is  with  the  working  class.  They  must 
first  become  conscious  of  their  class.  They  must  become 
"class-conscious"  before  we  can  expect  intelligent  action  from 
them.  The  chick  will  have  motion  withlhTIEe  shell  long 
days  before  its  brain  is  formed — the  brain  comes  last  in  de- 
velopment in  all  life — but  this  motion  will  not  be  intelligently 
directed  to  break  the  shell  until  the  brain  is  sufficiently  de- 
veloped to  give  it  this  conscious  direction.  It  is  the  same 
way  with  the  labor  movement  of  to-day.  It  staggers  blindly. 
When  the  labor  giant  is  hurt  it  strikes  out  blindly,  like  a  man 
half  paralyzed,  as  liable  to  hurt  itself  as  its  enemy.  Labor's 
brain  is  as  yet  undeveloped.  It  has  now  reached  the  "trade- 
union"  stage  of  development,  which  is  as  far  from  maturity 
as  is  the  brain  of  a  week-old  infant.  However,  "trade-union- 
ism" is  a  necessary  stage  in  the  progress  of  the  labor  brain, 
and  it  is  as  foolish  to  think  that  this  step  could  be  skipped 
as  it  is  to  think  that  while  labor  has  this  kind  of  a  brain 
that  it  can  think  out  clearly  the  Socialist  program. 

A  smart  child  will  learn  to  read  without  a  teacher,  but  he 
will  learn  more  rapidly  if  he  has  one.  Socialists  are  the  in- 
structors of  ignorant  and  immature  humanity. 


Columbia's  Eacb  For  Liberty  37 


COLUMBIA'S  RACE  FOR  LIBERTY 

(April,    1902.) 

TO  many  Americans  the  phrase  "Sweet  Land  of  Liberty" 
sounds  like  the  baldest  irony,  although  there  was  a 
time  when  it  was  taken  in  all  seriousness.  One  of  the 
most  significant  features  of  the  times  is  the  attitude  that 
"Life/'  a  humorous  weekly  having  its  circulation  almost 
exclusively  among  the  "400,"  is  taking  toward  our  modern 
plutocracy.  One  would  think  that  it  would  be  the  last  paper 
to  publish  such  a  cartoon  as  that  seen  on  the  opposite  page. 

Just  now,  no  doubt,  poor,  foolish  Columbia  is  valuing  the 
miserable  apples  of  Greed  and  Avarice  that  her  competitor, 
the  Trust,  casts  in  her  path  more  than  she  does  the  winning 
of  the  race  for  liberty.  But  the  race  is  not  by  any  means  so 
nearly  finished  as  the  plutocrats  in  the  royal  box  would  seem 
to  imagine.  The  Trust  has  one  more  apple  to  throw,  Fraud, 
and  will  needs  throw  it  soon,  and  then  his  last  card  will  have 
been  played.  Columbia  can  win  as  easily  as  could  the  goddess 
of  old,  and  certainly  will  win  notwithstanding  the  tricks  of 
her  competitor.  The  marvel,  however,  is  that  she  allows 
herself  to  be  tricked  even  for  a  moment. 

Why  is  it  that  a  people,  as  intelligent  as  we  Americans 
are,  allow  ourselves  to  be  kept  out  of  our  inheritance  by  such 
self-evident  trickery  as  the  Trust  is  now  imposing  upon  us? 
Here  we  have  a  country  abundantly  able  to  support  all  of  us 
in  affluence.  The  Trust,  by  the  great  economies  it  has  been 
able  to  effect  in  production,  has  confessedly  made  the  task 
of  producing  the  things  we  want  infinitely  easier  than  ever 
before,  yet  on  the  other  hand,  is  denying  men  employment, 
alleging  that  they  are  no  longer  needed  owing  to  these  self- 
same economies.  This  lack  of  employment,  of  course,  means 
the  impossibility  of  men  procuring  the  food  they  need,  and  all 
because  food  has  become  so  much  easier  to  produce. 

Is  it  not  absolutely  incomprehensible  to  think  that  we 
Americans  can  accept  such  a  condition  of  affairs  and  not 


38  Socialism  Inevitable 

see  the  utter  absurdity  of  it  all?  Here  we  are  in  a  land 
flowing  with  milk  and  honey,  which  by  the  aid  of  the  Trusts, 
we  have  arranged  to  procure  at  the  least  possible  expense  and 
exertion.  Further  to  lessen  the  task,  moreover,  we  have 
labored  for  years  and  years  inventing  and  constructing  ma- 
chinery: indeed  so  busy  have  we  been  that  we  have  almost 
forgotten  our  original  purpose  and  have  begun  to  think  that 
the  making  of  the  machines  was  an  end  in  itself  instead  of 
being  the  means  to  an  end.  Hence,  when  the  Trusts  came 
along  and  told  us  that  more  machines  are  now  built  than 
there  is  any  need  for,  and  that  consequently  our  labor  will 
be  no  longer  needed,  instead  of  throwing  up  our  caps  with 
a  "Huzza  Boys!  the  work  of  man  is  done;  now  let  us  use 
these  machines  over  the  making  of  which  we  have  spent  so 
many  weary  years  of  toil!"  I  say,  instead  of  making  any 
such  an  outcry  of  joy  at  the  completion  of  the  task,  we  are 
terrified  to  death  for  fear  that  unless  we  can  continue  the 
making  of  machines,  there  will  be  no  way  of  disposing  of 
our  labor  to  get  a  living.  We  laugh  at  the  Chinaman  who 
thought  the  only  way  to  roast  a  pig  was  to  burn  down  his 
hut,  yet  we  fail  to  see  the  striking  analogy  to  our  own  case. 

When  we  were  building  the  machinery  we  simply  made  a 
trade  of  our  labor.  Part  of  us  worked  in  the  fields  growing 
the  wheat,  and  part  in  the  machine  shops  making  mowing 
machines.  Then  we  exchanged  our  machines  for  the  wheat, 
and  fed  ourselves.  The  end,  of  course,  was  to  feed  ourselves, 
and  we  thought  to  attain  that  end  more  easily  by  building 
mowing  machines.  We  fed  ourselves  all  right  before  we 
ever  had  any  mowing  machines,  but  we  were  not  satisfied  to 
leave  well  enough  alone.  We  felt  that  we  had  to  do  better, 
and  we  certainly  succeeded,  for  one  man  with  modern  ma- 
chinery in  the  wheat  field  can  do  the  work  of  one  hundred 
ordinary  laborers ;  but  now  when  we  have  quite  finished  build- 
ing all  the  machines  we  need,  we  find  that  instead  of  getting 
one  hundred  times  as  much  wheat  as  formerly,  we  actually 
are  told  by  some  of  our  statesmen  that  we  may  not  even  get 
as  much  as  we  did  before  we  had  any  machines  at  all. 

The  only  hope  for  us,  according  to  some  people,  is  that 
we  develop  our  foreign  trade,  so  that  when  we  make  more 
mowing  machines  than  can  be  used  in  this  country,  the 
foreigner  will  take  pity  on  us  and  use  them  in  his  country. 


Columbia's  Race  For  Liberty  39 

This  is  called  by  the  Koosevelt-Hanna  combination,  "sal- 
vation by  reciprocity."  It  means  that  the  mere  finishing 
up  of  sufficient  mowing  machines  to  cut  all  our  American 
wheat  must  now  be  followed  up  by  the  building  of  mowing 
machines  for  all  the  rest  of  the  earth.  When  we  finally  finish 
this  mighty  task  we  are  not  to  expect  that  hundred  for  one 
return  that  we  have  been  awaiting  for,  lo,  now,  these  fifty 
years.  Not  at  all:  we  are  informed  that  after  we  have  built 
machines  for  all  the  world,  we  will  then  have  indeed  finished 
our  task  and  must  prepare  to  move  off  the  earth.  In  short, 
just  the  time  when  we  think  we  are  getting  in  shape  to  rest 
and  enjoy  life,  we  are  told  it  is  time  to  die! 

We  are  not  going  to  move  off  the  earth,  however,  and 
neither  do  we  propose  to  shuffle  off  this  mortal  coil.  We 
are  going  to  awaken  to  the  fact  that  we  have  been  fools  long 
enough,  and  will  hereafter  let  the  machines  do  our  work; 
eating  our  bread  without  any  pangs  of  conscience  that  it  is 
produced  by  the  harnessing  of  Niagara  rather  than  by  the 
sweat  of  our  noble  brows.  If  anybody  wishes  to  sweat,  let 
him  take  a  vapor  bath;  but  as  for  us  we  see  no  terrors  in  a 
dry-browed  future.  At  any  rate  we  are  going  to  have  one  try 
at  it,  even  if  we  lose. 

This  must  not  be  taken  to  mean  that  labor,  like  virtue, 
is  not  its  own  reward ;  but  simply  as  a  protest  against  getting 
too  much  of  a  good  thing.  We  are,  indeed,  too  apt  at  times  to 
look  upon  the  product  as  the  only  possible  reward  for  work, 
whereas,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  there  is  an  equal  reward  in  the 
very  work  that  led  to  the  product,  although  our  modern 
methods  of  employment  quite  obscure  it.  For  a  healthy  man 
there  is  joy  in  the  digging  of  post-holes,  provided  there  are 
not  too  many  to  be  dug  in  a  day,  and  certainly  more  satis- 
faction than  there  can  be  in  the  mere  possession  of  the  holes 
after  they  are  dug.  What  painter  ever  enjoyed  the  possession 
of  his  picture  as  much  as  he  did  the  painting  of  it?  I  am 
sure  if  Pierpont  Morgan  were  to  analyze  his  feelings,  he 
would  admit  that  his  pleasure  in  forming  the  United  States 
Steel  Company  was  far  greater  than  any  he  may  now  have 
in  possessing  the  cash  and  bonds  he  received  for  doing  the 
work.  Even  the  mere  reminiscence  of  achievement  is  a 
greater  pleasure  than  the  possession  of  a  material  reward. 

This  reward,  intrinsic  to  actual  work,  runs  through  all 


40  Socialism  Inevitable 

nature.  We  see  it  in  the  intense  delight  of  children  to  do 
something  of  use  for  their  elders.  What  little  girl  in  fortu- 
nate circumstances  does  not  like  to  make  an  effort  at  cooking 
or  sewing  for  her  mother?  But  when  we  see  a  little  girl 
sewing  her  soul  into  her  work  in  a  sweater's  den  we  can 
hardly  realize  that  under  different  conditions  that  same  work 
which  now  wears  the  child's  life  away  might  be  a  joy  to  her. 
It  is  not  work,  but  over-work,  that  is  painful. 

The  exact  determination  of  the  boundary  between  work  and 
over-work  is,  of  course,  impossible.  A  man  will  perform 
prodigies  of  labor  during  a  hunting  trip  that  will  but  add  to 
his  health,  whereas  the  same  amount  of  work  done  digging 
post-holes  would  be  heart-breaking  drudgery.  Similarly  Ed- 
ison, working  night  and  day  to  perfect  an  invention,  can 
do  the  most  strenuous  work  with  no  ill  results  to  his  health, 
whereas  if  he  were  without  the  stimulus  of  pleasure  he  would 
break  down  at  it.  It  is  often  said  that  when  a  successful 
business  man  does  far  more  work  than  his  meanest  employee 
— which  is  frequently  the  case — his  material  reward  should 
be  reckoned  accordingly.  This  reasoning,  however,  entirely 
overlooks  the  reward  that  exists  in  the  work  itself.  That 
there  is  more  joy  in  giving  than  receiving  is  a  truism,  but 
that  the  joy  of  giving  consists  in  the  doing  of  the  work  which 
produces  the  gift  is  often  overlooked.  Nevertheless,  if  we 
analyze  some  of  our  social  customs  we  will  find  that  this 
idea  that  there  is  pleasure  in  making  a  gift  of  the  products 
of  our  labor,  when  that  labor  is  confessedly  from  its  nature 
of  a  pleasurable  kind,  is  tacitly  admitted;  for  such  a  gift  is 
conventionally  possible  among  equals  and  friends,  where  any 
other  would  be  impossible. 

For  instance,  if  I  go  shooting  and  send  a  brace  of  wild 
ducks  to  my  friend,  he  will  gladly  accept  them,  even  if  he 
has  a  suspicion  that  I  bought  them  in  the  market;  for  there 
is  a  chance  that  I  really  have  shot  them  myself,  and  anyway 
I  have  had  the  fun  of  the  trying.  Hence  he  feels  that  in 
accepting  them  he  is  under  no  obligation.  If,  on  the  other 
hand,  I  should  send  him  a  pair  of  tame  ducks  with  no  in- 
timation that  I  had  acquired  them  in  any  other  way  than  by 
purchase,  the  present  would  be  regarded  in  the  light  of  an 
insult.  I  can  only  give  him  tame  ducks  if  it  is  known  that 
I  am  playing  the  gentleman  farmer  and  am  raising  ducks 


Columbia's  Hace  For  Libert*  41 

purely  for  amusement.  These  customs,  I  repeat,  have  at  base 
a  clear  recognition  of  the  delights  of  labor  when  performed 
under  proper  conditions. 

The  statement  seems  absurd  to  many  that  labor,  in  the 
future,  under  Socialism,  will  give  quite  as  much  pleasure, 
if  indeed  not  more  pleasure,  in  the  doing  of  it  than  in  par- 
ticipation in  its  results.  Where  does  the  pleasure  come  in 
to-day  when  we  go  off  to  the  woods  for  a  week's  picnic?  It 
is  certainly  not  in  the  eating  of  the  fish  or  game  that  may 
be  killed.  In  fact  people  often  go  out  camping  and  take  all 
their  provisions  with  them.  Of  course  the  change  from  con- 
ventional city  life  is  a  relief,  but  I  venture  to  say  that  a  great 
amount  of  the  pleasure  consists  in  doing  the  necessary  camp 
work.  I  think  it  will  be  admitted  by  those  who  have  tried 
both  ways,  that  when  servants  are  taken  along  to  do  the  work, 
half  the  pleasure  of  a  camping  trip  is  lost. 

It  is  quite  true  that  all  high  civilizations  in  the  past  have 
been  based  upon  the  servitude  of  man  to  man.  A  select  few 
have  been  permitted  to  live  a  higher  life  perched  on  the  backs 
of  the  many.  And  far  be  it  from  me  to  say  that  there  is 
not  a  strong  argument  in  favor  of  having  a  small  class  enjoy 
the  delights  of  culture  rather  than  have  the  whole  mass 
brutalized.  Man  must  have  servants  to  take  the  labor  of 
getting  a  living  off  his  shoulders  sufficiently  to  develop  his 
intellect,  but  there  is  no  reason  why  the  servant  should  not  be 
a  machine  rather  than  a  fellow  man.  It  is  not  the  nature  of 
the  servant  that  gives  the  necessary  leisure;  it  is  the  nature 
of  the  service.  I  must  have  food  and  clothing,  but  the  slave 
that  provides  them  can  be  operated  by  muscle  or  by  steam. 

Even  on  the  camping  trip  it  must  be  remembered  that, 
although  we  may  take  no  servants  with  us,  we  take  congealed 
labor  along  in  our  flour  and  bacon,  our  blankets,  our  guns, 
and,  in  fact,  the  whole  of  our  camp  accoutrements.  And  the 
goods  we  take  with  us  represent  just  so  much  less  labor  for 
us  to  perform  while  on  the  trip. 

I  am  dwelling  upon  this  idea  of  the  pleasure  of  work  be- 
cause I  feel  that  many  of  those  who  have  wealth  to-day  look 
with  unnecessary  horror  upon  a  change  of  society  which  will 
necessitate  conditions  in  which  all  must  work.  They  not 
unnaturally  think  that  by  "work"  is  meant  the  kind  of 
drudgery  performed  by  the  laborers,  clerks  and  servants  about 


42  Socialism  Inevitable 

them,  and  I  certainly  do  not  blame  a  man  raised  in  the  lap 
of  luxury  for  looking  with  consternation  upon  such  a  life. 
It  is  but  natural  that  he  should  make  up  his  mind  to  fight 
to.  the  death  to  resist  any  such  change.  I  know  that  in  the 
days  before  I  was  a  Socialist  and  had  simply  a  vague  idea 
that  Socialism  meant  drudgery  for  everyone,  and  that  it  was 
to  come,  if  ever  it  did  come,  through  the  deliberate  organizing 
of  the  working  class  to  take  possession  of  the  wealth  of  the 
rich ;  I  say  that  when  I  thought  this,  I,  too,  made  up  my  mind 
to  fight  to  the  last  ditch  rather  than  let  it  occur.  I  felt  that 
I  might  as  well  be  dead  as  live  the  life  of  the  poor  around 
w-^ine,  and  that  I  could  risk  nothing  by  fighting,  and  might 
gain.  In  those  days  I  had  not  heard  of  social  evolution  as 
something  that  was  of  present-day  importance.  It  had  never 
been  suggested  to  me  that  Socialism  was  coming  like  the 
winter's  snow,  and  that  I  might  as  well  try  to  fight  off  the 
snow  with  Krupp  guns  as  to  resist  it.  That  Socialism  was 
inevitable,  and  that  it  meant  not  drudgery  but  universal  joy, 
suddenly  broke  upon  me  one  day  like  a  flood  of  light.  It  was 
no  supernatural  light  either,  that  led  to  my  conversion,  but 
simply  deductions  obtained  from  a  study  of  the  Trust,  and  my 
.  knowledge  of  the  business  conditions  that  led  to  its  appear- 
ance. 

I  made  a  flop  in  one  night,  about  fifteen  years  ago,  and 
from  being  the  most  extreme  follower  of  the  laissez  faire 
school  of  economists  became  the  most  extreme  of  the  col- 
lectivist  school.  There  was  no  step-by-step  process  in  my 
evolution,  and  I  have  never  budged  an  inch  in  my  economics 
since  my  change  of  belief.  Immediately  upon  my  conversion, 
moreover,  I  became  a  propagandist  and  thought,  in  the  inno- 
cence of  my  heart,  that  every  man  I  talked  to  would  see 
things  as  I  did,  and  follow  suit".  """"" 

The  economic  necessity  of  Socialism  seemed  so  easily  proved 
that  I  was  really  green  enough  to  think  that  Mr.  Rockefeller 
himself  would  see  the  point  when  it  was  shown  to  him,  and 
might  even  join  in  the  movement  to  introduce  Socialism. 
Upon  this  theory  I  actually  wrote  him  a  very  polite  letter, 
showing  how  he  had  a  chance  to  go  down  in  history  as  the 
apostle  of  Socialism  if  he  would  but  turn  his  vast  wealth  to 
that  end.  I  am  still  waiting  hopefully  for  his  reply.  It 
will  soon  be  fifteen  years,  but  still  my  patience  is  not  ex- 


Columbia's  Race  For  Liberty  43 

hausted.  In  the  meantime,  however,  Mr.  Pierpont  Morgan 
has  appeared  on  the  financial  horizon,  so  that  there  is  a 
double  string  to  my  bow.  It  may  appear  to  some  that  it  is  the 
height  of  absurdity  for  me  to  suggest  in  any  way,  except  as 
a  joke,  that  Rockefeller  or  Morgan  would  ever  accept  the 
Socialist  theory,  and  actually  assist  in  its  consummation.  I 
admit  that  my  experience  in  gaining  converts  from  the  rich 
does  not  justify  me  in  my  hopes,  yet  we  must  remember  that 
hope  is  notable  for  its  triumphs  over  experience. 

To  prove  that  Socialism  is  inevitable  is  as  simple  a  prob- 
lem to  me  as  to  demonstrate  that  two  and  two  are  four.  If 
this  demonstration  were  one  that  I  would  rather  not  have 
heard,  and  this  is  sometimes  the  case,  I  certainly  would  not 
so  stultify  myself  as  to  refuse  to  admit  that  two  and  two 
continue  to  make  four.  Now  there  is  nothing  particularly 
different  in  the  make-up  of  Mr.  Rockefeller  and  myself,  and 
whatever  difference  there  is  should  make  him  still  more  likely 
to  come  to  my  view  of  the  case.  He  is  much  better  at  figures 
than  I  can  ever  hope  to  be,  and  should  therefore  arrive  at 
my  conclusion  upon  mathematical  grounds  much  sooner  than 
I  did,  once  his  attention  is  called  to  the  problem.  Upon 
ethical  grounds,  moreover,  he  certainly  has  far  more  reason  to 
come  to  my  convictions  than  ever  I  had.  I  never  6et  myself 
up  as  a  man  to  lead  the  prayer  meetings,  and  have  never  been 
an  elder  in  the  church.  In  short,  I  never  made  the  least 
claim  to  any  altruism  in  my  make-up :  I  simply  made  a  study  1 
of  how  to  amuse  number  one.  Nor  have  I  professed  anything  ' 
different  since  I  became  a  Socialist. 

Hence  it  seems  to  me  that  Mr.  Rockefeller,  as  well  as  Mr. 
Morgan,  who  are  both  good  at  figures  besides  being  devoutly 
religious,  are  theoretically  bound  to  come  sooner  or  later  into 
the  collectivist  school  of  economics,  and  become  contributors 
to  this  magazine.  They  both  pray  every  day  to  the  Lord  that 
His  "will  be  done  on  earth  as  it  is  in  heaven."  I  would  ask 
any  good  Christian  who  is  not  a  Socialist,  if  such  there  be, 
what  is  his  idea  of  God's  will  on  earth?  Wherein  does  his 
idea  of  the  kinerdom  of  God  on  earth  differ  from  the  idea 
that  the  Socialists  have  of  the  earth  under  Socialism?  Of 
course.  I  can  understand  how  Mr.  Rockefeller  would  disagree 
with  the  Democrat  or  the  Populist  who  wishes  to  destroy  the 
trusts,  but  I  do  not  see  wherein  he  and  the  Socialist  would 


44  Socialism  Inevitable 

have  any  room  for  discussion.  Even  upon  the  point  of  private 
ownership  versus  public  ownership  of  the  Standard  Oil  Trust 
Mr.  Rockefeller  would  be  in  agreement,  for  we  both  say  that 
the  change  cannot  be  made  before  the  people  wish  it,  and  that 
after  the  people  do  so  declare  that  such  is  their  wish,  there  will 
be  no  resisting  them.  Probably  Mr.  Rockefeller  would  not 
yet  be  in  favor  of  the  nationalization  of  the  trusts;  but  he 
could  easily  excuse  himself  by  saying  that  he  is  simply  averse 
to  doing  anything  that  the  people  do  not  wish  done,  and  he 
would  be  fully  justified  in  his  contention  that  the  people  have 
done  little  to  indicate  that  they  wish  any  such  step  taken. 

Young  Mr.  Rockefeller  declared  the  other  day  that  the  de- 
velopment of  the  Trust  was  like  unto  the  development  of  an 
American  Beauty  rose.  That  to  have  a  fine  rose  many  buds 
must  be  pinched  off  and  their  sap  turned  to  the  remaining 
one;  and  he  paralleled  it  in  saying  that  to  have  one  great 
business  many  smaller  ones  must  be  exterminated.  This 
again  is  in  line  with  the  Socialist's  idea.  The  Standard  Oil 
Trust  is  itself  but  a  large  bud,  and  it,  too,  must  be  pinched 
off  in  order  that  its  sap  may  flow  to  the  American  nation  as 
a  whole,  for  the  Nation  is  the  American  Beauty  rose  that  we 
are  all  interested  in  developing  to  its  highest  possibilities. 

Pinch,  brothers,  pinch,  pinch  with  care, 
ly  Pinch  every  trust  that  absorbs  our  air. 


The  Fallacy  Of  Pcblio  Ownership  45 


THE   FALLACY    OF    PUBLIC    OWNERSHIP 

(May,    1902.) 

AS  an  interested  spectator  I  attended  a  convention  last 
month  at  Louisville,  Ky.,  called  for  the  purpose  of 
effecting  a  union  of  all  reform  parties  with  the  Popu- 
list Party.  Only  the  so-called  Public  Ownership  Party,  how- 
ever, apart  from  the  Populists  themselves,  were  officially 
represented,  though  seventy-five  delegates,  in  all,  attended. 
The  allied  People's  Party  was  the  name  chosen  for  the  new 
organization  with  a  platform  which  had  little  in  it  beyond 
a  demand  for  Public  Ownership  of  Public  Utilities  and  for 
the  Initiative  and  Eeferendum. 

The  convention  adjourned  on  April  5th,  and  that  night 
an  open  meeting  was  held  in  the  convention  hall  at  which  I 
had  the  honor  of  being  the  principal  speaker.  I  was  very 
glad  of  the  opportunity  afforded  me  to  explain  to  the  Populist 
delegates  the  difference  between  their  theory  of  politics  and 
that  of  the  Socialists,  and  I  am  confident  that  my  remarks 
will  bear  considerable  fruition.  ^^-^^ 

The  Populists  to-day  are  ripe  for  Socialism,  and,  indeed, 
seem  rather  hurt  if  you  question  their  sympathy  with  the 
movement.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  however,  I  think  very  few 
of  them  have  any  political  ideal  other  than  the  present  com- 
petitive system,  tempered  with  Public  Ownership  and  con- 
trolled by  the  Initiative  and  Eeferendum. 

Now,  let  me  say  at  once  that  I,  too,  am  in  favor  of  the 
Initiative  and  Eeferendum  and  of  Public  Ownership,  and 
advocated  these  important  measures,  both  on  the  stump  and 
in  the  press,  five  years  before  the  Populist  Party  was  born. 
I  would  furthermore  be  the  first  to  agree  that  of  all  reform 
measures  to-day,  these  are  probably  the  most  important.  In- 
deed I  might  say  that  if  I  thought  either  of  them  could  be 
gained  at  once  by  dropping  the  Socialist  program  and  con- 
centrating upon  it,  I  would  feel  justified  in  joining  such  a 
policy.    Hence,  it  is  not  that  I  am  impatient  for  the  whole 


46  Socialism  Inevitable 

program,  or  that  I  decry  the  importance  of  these  measures, 
that  I  refuse  to  bother  with  them,  but  simply  because  I  think 
the  best  way  to  get  the  part  is  to  demand  the  whole,  if  it  be 
not  actually  easier  to  get  the  whole  than  any  of  its  parts. 

In  the  first  place,  in  order  to  get  the  people  to  move  you 
must  give  them  a  reason  for  moving.  The  mere  fact  that  a 
man  has  arms  is  no  assurance  that  he  will  work  unless  he 
finds  some  reason  for  doing  so.  I  use  my  arms  to  get  my 
dinner,  but  if  there  is  no  dinner  in  prospect  my  arms  will 
not  be  used.  And  so  it  is  with  the  Initiative  and  Keferendum : 
I  must  first  know  of  something  to  be  gained  by  political 
power  before  I  will  want  that  power.  Then  if  I  find  that 
the  present  representative  system  does  not  aid  me  in  getting 
what  I  want,  and  think  that  Direct  Legislation  will,  I  will 
work  for  the  Initiative  and  Keferendum.  But  in  order  to 
get  me  to  work  for  it  you  must  first  show  me  what  I  am  to 
gain  by  such  a  political  reform. 

Every  Socialist  sees  a  great  ideal  in  Socialism,  and  there- 
fore takes  an  interest  in  any  political  measure  that  promises 
the  realization  of  that  ideal.  Hence  we  see  in  certain  Euro- 
pean countries,  notably  Belgium  at  present,  that  the  Social- 
ists are  at  the  forefront  in  demanding  universal  suffrage.  In 
our  country,  of  course,  we  have  universal  suffrage,  but  as  the 
people  are  such  fools  that  they  do  not  know  how  to  use  this 
complicated  weapon,  Socialists  favor  giving  them  a  more 
simple  way  of  expressing  their  views  at  the  polls ;  and  there- 
fore are  in  full  sympathy  with  the  demand  for  Direct  Legisla- 
tion. Indeed  it  has  been  a  cardinal  plank  in  their  political 
platforms  for  twenty  years  or  more. 

Now  the  ideal  that  the  Populists  are  holding  up  to  the 
people  to  be  gained  by  Direct  Legislation  is  that  of  Public 
Ownership  of  Monopolies,  and  the  question  to  be  decided  is 
whether  such  an  ideal  can  in  any  way  be  regarded  as  a  better 
vote-getter  than  that  of  Socialism. 

Granting  that  both  Public  Ownership  and  Socialism  are 
equal  in  their  practicability,  and  that  one  could  be  put  in 
operation,  if  the  people  willed  it,  as  soon  as  the  other,  there 
is  absolutely  no  comparison  between  the  two  programs  simply 
as  ideals.  Socialism  is  heaven:  Public  Ownership,  at  best, 
is  a  third-rate  boarding  house.  Of  course  the  Populist  will 
reply  that  Public  Ownership  has  the  advantage  of  being  more 


The  Fallacy  Of  Public  Ownership  47 

easily  understood,  and  that  it  is  something  the  people  are 
ready  to  adopt  right  now,  whereas  Socialism  is  looked  upon 
as  a  beautiful  dream,  and  quite  outside  the  realm  of  prac- 
tical politics.  Furthermore  they  claim  that  the  tremendous 
majorities  given  last  month  in  Chicago  for  Public  Ownership 
is  conclusive  evidence  that  the  people  are  ready  right  now  for 
such  a  program. 

Facts,  certainly,  are  stubborn  things,  and  if  the  vote  ex- 
pressed by  the  ^Referendum  in  Chicago  is  indicative  of  the 
sentiment  throughout  the  United  States,  and  I  admit  it  is 
to  a  certain  extent,  andnf^t" political  party  can  be  built  upon 
such  a  sentiment,  then  certainly  the  Public  Ownership  policy 
is  a  good  political  policy  for  the  new  Allied  People's  Party 
to  adopt.  But  I  doubt  if  any  political  party  can  be  built 
upon  a  policy  of  Public  Ownership,  although  both  Democrats 
and  Eepublicans  will  adopt  such  a  program  in  its  entirety 
if  they  see  that  they  must  do  so  in  order  to  win.  The  vote 
in  Chicago,  it  is  to  be  remembered,  was  not  a  party  vote, 
and  I  do  not  think  there  has  ever  developed  a  division  between 
the  old  parties  on  the  question  of  Public  Ownership. 

No  sooner  will  the  sentiment  become  powerful  enough  than 
every  candidate  of  every  party  will  declare  in  its  favor. 
They  will  do  this  to  insure  their  election,  and  even  though 
they  may  not  intend  at  the  time  of  their  declaration  to  carry 
out  their  pledges,  yet  with  the  growth  of  sentiment  upon  the 
subject  there  can  be  no  doubt  of  the  people's  will  ultimately 
being  obeyed.  In  short,  the  movement  toward  Public  Owner- 
ship coincides  with  the  interests  of  such  a  large  proportion 
of  the  population  and  runs  counter  to  so  few  that  I  cannot 
see  the  possibility  of  any  party  being  formed  to  oppose  it. 
Nor  would  it  seem  necessary  to  form  a  party  to  carry  it  into 
effect,  since  the  established  parties  will  carry  it  forward  to 
preserve  their  very  existence. 

This  sentiment  for  Public  Ownership,  moreover,  except  so 
far  as  it  relates  to  railroads  and  telegraphs,  is  very  likely  to 
be  of  local  nature.  Chicago  demands  Public  Ownership,  not 
so  much  because  she  has  any  clear  idea  of  its  benefits,  but 
because  she  has  so  fully  experienced  the  iniquity  of  private 
ownership.  But  many  cities  have  not  had  the  advantage  of 
such  able  and  courageous  instructors  in  economics  as  has 
Chicago  with  her  boodle  aldermen,  and  even  where  con- 


48  Socialism  Inevitable 

siderable  effort  has  been  made  to  educate  the  people  in  this 
regard,  as  in  my  native  city  of  Cincinnati  for  instance,  it 
does  not  seem  to  follow  that  any  great  benefit  will  result. 

I  was  in  Cincinnati  last  month  at  the  time  the  election 
returns  from  Chicago  came  in,  and  was  informed  by  citizens, 
who  seemed  competent  to  judge,  that  there  was  no  such  senti- 
ment in  their  city  as  in  Chicago.  Now  Cincinnati  has  been 
for  years  notoriously  under  the  domination  of  the  Gas,  the 
Street  Bailway  and  the  Telephone  Companies,  who  have  a 
beautiful  combination  to  rob  her  of  all  she  may  possess;  yet 
she  has  not  even  made  up  her  mind  to  have  a  change. 

Then  there  are  many  cities  that  receive  much  better  service 
from  their  private  corporations,  and  so  take  little  direct  in- 
terest in  what  concerns  their  sister  cities  so  vitally.  Or  again, 
Chicago  might  be  successful  in  her  demand  for  the  municipal 
ownership  of  her  public  utilities,  and  the  moment  this  occurred 
would  fall  out  of  the  fighting  line,  having  gained  her  own 
ends.  No  matter  how  much  she  might  be  interested,  from 
the  altruistic  standpoint,  in,  say,  Cincinnati,  since  she  could 
not  vote  in  the  Cincinnati  elections,  such  a  sentiment  would 
not  carry  much  political  weight.  It  also  must  be  remembered 
that  more  than  half  the  population  of  the  country  live  on 
farms  and  in  small  villages,  where  there  are  not  now,  nor 
ever  can  be,  any  purely  municipal  problems  to  be  solved. 
Hence  as  the  Populist  party  is  born  of  the  farmers,  it  cannot 
look  for  the  farmers'  support  upon  a  Municipal  Public  Own- 
ership platform. 

There  remains,  then,  the  consideration  of  the  platform 
being  successful  with  those  who  demand  the  public  ownership 
of  railways,  telegraphs  and  natural  monopolies.  That  the 
sentiment  in  this  direction  is  growing  very  fast  cannot  be 
denied,  but  that  it  will  crystallize  into  a  party  platform  and 
be  opposed  by  other  party  platforms  I  very  much  doubt. 
There  are  vast  numbers  of  people  who  are  so  indirectly  af- 
fected by  the  railway  tariffs  that  it  will  probably  be  very  hard 
to  arouse  their  support.  For  instance,  it  would  be  extremely 
difficult  to  convince  a  city  laborer  that  the  government  owner- 
ship of  railways  would  help  him  as  much  as  a  ton  of  coal  in 
the  cellar  sent  around  by  "Bath-House  Tim,"  the  president  of 
Tammany  Club  No.  6.  What  the  laborer  is  interested  in  is, 
not  the  farmer  nor  the  merchant,  but  himself.     He  wants, 


The  Fallacy  Of  Public  Ownership  49 

first  and  foremost,  a  job,  and  after  he  has  a  reasonable 
assurance  of  that,  he  begins  to  think  of  better  wages.  Beyond 
this  idea  the  average  laborer  seldom  rises,  and  nobody  can 
blame  him  who  remembers  that  self-preservation  is  the  first 
law  of  nature. 

Now,  let  us  for  a  moment  consider  the  ideal  presented  by 
a  complete  system  of  Public  Ownership  of  "Monopolies,"  both 
municipal  and  national.  And  by  "Monopolies"  I  mean  not 
all  the  means  of  production  and  distribution,  but  a  selected 
few,  such  as  the  gas  and  water  supplies,  etc.,  of  cities,  the  rail- 
roads of  the  country,  and  possibly  a  few  of  the  trusts.  We 
already  know  from  the  experience  of  other  cities  and  countries 
that  Public  Ownership,  while  having  many  advantages  over 
private  ownership,  is  no  solution  of  the  labor  problem.  I 
remember  well  that  the  one  sight  that  impressed  itself  upon 
me  in  Glasgow  was  the  number  of  miserable  women  seen  in 
the  wet  streets  puddling  about  with  bare  feet,  and  usually 
with  bare  heads.  This  is  something  I  have  never  seen  in 
Paris  or  London  or  New  York,  and  is  not  a  reassuring  picture 
of  the  benefit  to  labor  flowing  from  Municipal  Ownership,  for 
it  must  be  remembered  that  Glasgow  owns  all  her  public 
utilities,  including  the  street-car  lines.  Moreover,  we  are 
to-day  hearing  of  a  threatened  social  revolution  in  Belgium, 
although  Belgium  is  par  excellence  the  country  of  Public 
Ownership.  Not  only  are  the  municipal  utilities  owned  by 
the  cities,  but  the  State  owns  the  railways  and  telegraphs, 
and  yet  Belgium  is  no  Utopia. 

Public  Ownership  upon  the  lines  laid  down  as  above,  sim- 
ply means  a  certain  probable  benefit  to  those  workmen  who 
happen  to  be  employed  in  the  utilities  taken  over  by  the  pub- 
lic, and  further  benefit  to  the  public  that  is  served  by  the  said 
utilities.  This  last  benefit,  however,  may  be  of  but  very  tem- 
porary duration,  so  far  as  the  economy  of  the  service  is  con- 
cerned, for  in  the  first  place,  it  is  not  at  all  certain  that  much 
economy  can  be  effected  if  the  wages  of  employees  are  raised 
and  the  hours  shortened,  and  even  if  there  were  a  marked 
economy,  it  is  almost  a  certainty  that  the  price  received  by 
the  manufacturers  and  shippers  would  in  most  cases  recede 
by  competition  to  a  point  where  all  that  was  gained  by  a 
lowering  of  freight  rates  would  be  lost. 

As  far  as  the  trusts  go  they  now  charge  for  their  goods 


50  Socialism  Inevitable 

all  that  the  traffic  will  bear;  and  those  that  are  not  national- 
ized would  naturally  gain  for  themselves  any  advantage  in 
the  lowering  of  freight  rates;  but  I  do  not  see  where  either 
their  employees  or  the  consumer  would  come  in.  The  farmer 
shipping  wheat  would,  of  course,  gain  by  a  lowered  freight 
rate,  as  the  price  of  wheat  is  not  fixed  by  competition  limited 
to  this  country,  but  in  the  world  market. 

But  the  wheat  farmer  is  not  the  typical  farmer.  If  he 
were,  then  certainly  the  farmers  would  be  fools  not  to  favor 
nationalizing  railways.  If  the  Public  Ownership  policy  were 
carried  into  effect  it  would  simply  mean  that  the  holders  of 
the  wealth  not  nationalized  would  get  all  the  profits.  That 
is,  if  the  Vanderbilt  railways  were  nationalized,  then  Van- 
derbilt  would  buy  up  the  flour  mills  and  get  his  profits  out 
of  them  instead  of  out  of  the  railways. 

It  must  always  be  remembered  that  under  the  competitive 
wage  system  the  whole  of  the  product,  above  and  beyond 
what  must  be  given  as  wages  to  the  laborers  in  order  that 
they  can  buy  enough  to  keep  themselves  alive,  falls  to  the 
capitalist  class,  under  the  various  names  of  rent,  interest  and 
profits;  so  that  Public  Ownership  can  do  nothing  but  effect 
a  different  method  of  division  among  the  capitalists.  This 
means  that  the  laborers  must  remain  where  they  are  as  long 
as  the  competitive  wage  system  prevails. 

To-day  we  see  the  Beef  Trust  raising  its  prices  to  unheard- 
of  rates.  Does  this  mean  that  the  workman  will  eat  less 
meat?  Not  necessarily;  he  may  think  that  he  must  have 
what  he  has  been  accustomed  to,  and  that  if  he  must  pay 
more,  then  he  will  either  strike  for  higher  wages  to  allow  a 
continuance  of  his  usual  rations  of  beef,  or  he  will  cut  off 
on  some  other  portion  of  his  expenditure,  say  his  sugar  or  his 
coal  oil.  But  whatever  he  does,  it  means  that  until  some 
other  trust  puts  up  its  price,  the  Beef  Trust  will  be  just  so 
much  ahead.  Then  suppose  the  Sugar  Trust  follows  suit. 
Again  the  workman  may  either  strike  for  more  wages  or 
he  may  eat  less  sugar,  or  he  may  eat  the  same  amount  and 
cut  down  his  bread  allowance.  If  he  eats  the  same  amount, 
the  Sugar  Trust  just  gains  so  much  at  the  expense  of  some 
other  trust.  It's  a  very  pretty  game  this,  now  being  played 
by  the  trusts,  each  seeing  how  high  it  can  put  prices,  and 


The  Fallacy  Of  Public  Ownership  51 

knowing  that  the  higher  the  price  to  the  workman,  the  less 
there  is  for  the  other  fellows. 

Now,  if  we  had  the  municipal  ownership  of  street  cars, 
and  Tom  Johnson's  three-cent  fare  program,  it  would  simply 
mean  that  there  would  be  a  swoop  of  the  capitalists  for  that 
two  cents  the  workingman  has  saved,  each  trying  to  carry 
off  the  whole  of  it.  The  workman  would  not  hold  it  long 
enough  to  get  it  warm  before  the  landlord  would  tell  him  that 
owing  to  the  great  demand  for  houses  incident  to  the  lower 
street-car  fares  he  was  very  sorry  to  inform  him  that  land 
values  and  rents  had  gone  up,  and  that  as  a  consequence  he 
must  expect  to  pay  an  advanced  rent  hereafter  for  his  house. 
The  landlord  might  also  tell  him  that  it  would  not  be  felt 
because  the  saving  on  car  fare  that  he  and  his  family  would 
make  every  month  would  offset  the  increase  in  rent.  Then, 
if  there  were  anything  left,  the  Beef  Trust  might  find  it 
out  and  put  up  the  price  of  its  beef,  and  so  on  right  down 
along  the  line  until  the  two  cents  would  simply  be  a  misty 
memory. 

Yet  the  main  indictment  I  have  agaiust  a  political  pro- 
gram limited  to  Public  Ownership  is  the  one  I  dwelt  mostly 
upon  in  my  speech  before  the  Allied  Party  Convention,  viz:, 
that  it  takes  no  note  of  the  tendency  of  our  industrial  develop- 
ment shortly  to  bring  about  a  great  unemployed  problem. 
The  trusts  mean  that  the  creation  of  new  machinery,  which 
has  so  long  given  employment  to  labor,  is  now  about  to  come 
to  an  end  simply  because  there  is  no  new  machinery  to  create, 
a  problem  for  which  Public  Ownership  offers  absolutely  no 
solution,  inasmuch  as  its  cause  lies  in  the  competitive  wage 
system  which  the  public  ownership  people  do  not  seem  to 
have  the  faintest  idea  of  abolishing.  There  is  but  one  way 
of  abolishing  the  competitive  wage  system,  and  that  is  by 
the  substitution  of  the  co-operative  wage  system,  otherwise 
Socialism. 

The  argument  that  Socialism  is  impracticable,  while  Public 
Ownership  is  practicable,  is  just  the  reverse  of  the  truth.  In 
the  first  place,  Public  Ownership,  as  we  have  shown,  is  im- 
practicable because  it  fails  to  answer  the  most  important  of 
all  the  political  questions  of  the  future,  namely,  that  of  the 
unemployed  problem.  In  the  next  place,  even  were  there 
no  unemployed  problem  to  be  solved,  the  Nationalization  of 


52  Socialism  Inevitable 

Industry,  if  put  into  effect  upon  any  considerable  scale,  would 
create  such  a  revolutionary  change  in  our  industrial  and 
financial  affairs  that  it  would  surely  be  a  precursor  of  a 
revolutionary  social  movement. 

Suppose  we  accomplish  the  first  impossibility  and  get  the 
trust-owned  Congress  either  to  grant  us  the  Initiative  and 
Referendum,  by  which  we  could  get  Public  Ownership  our- 
selves, or  grant  it  to  us  direct.  To  me  it  seems  absurd  that 
either  of  these  events  could  take  place.  The  trusts  may  make 
some  concessions  to  public  opinion,  but  they  will  hardly  com- 
mit suicide. 

Let  us  suppose,  however,  that  Congress  does  nationalize 
the  trusts  and  the  railroads.  Of  course,  in  any  partial  nation- 
alizing process  we  must  manifestly  pay  the  owners  for  their 
property.  They  must  be  paid,  for  confiscation  would  mean 
revolution  right  then  and  there.  Hence,  there  would  be 
placed  in  their  hands  an  enormous  sum  of  floating  capital  in 
the  shape  of  cash  or  bonds,  and  the  owners  would  have  the 
rest  of  the  world  at  their  mercy.  It  would  mean,  when  Mr. 
Eockefeller  sold  his  Standard  Oil  Trust,  and  Mr.  Morgan 
his  Steel  Trust,  and  Mr.  Yanderbilt  his  Railway  Trust  to 
Uncle  Sam,  that  these  three  gentlemen  would  have  in  their 
hands  funds  enough  to  give  them  the  control  of  the  whole 
of  the  remaining  industries  in  the  United  States.  They 
could — and  not  only  could,  but  undoubtedly  would, — expro- 
priate every  last  one  of  the  smaller  capitalists  whose  business 
had  not  been  sufficiently  trustified  to  make  the  Public  Owner- 
ship people  think  that  it  was  necessary  to  nationalize  them. 

Hence  I  declare  that  Public  Ownership  is  a  poor  platform 
politically,  because  it  fails  to  hold  up  any  great  ideal  to 
arouse  the  enthusiasm  of  the  people.  It  is  a  poor  platform 
economically,  because  it  would  fail  to  answer  the  unemployed 
problem,  and,  moreover,  it  could  not  possibly  be  put  in  opera- 
tion without  causing  a  social  revolution.  It  is  a  poor  plat- 
form ethically,  because  it  recognizes  the  right  of  a  class,  and 
one  no  better  because  somewhat  smaller  than  the  present 
capitalist  class,  to  live  of  the  fruits  of  the  toil  of  another 
class. 


The  Trust  Overshadows  All  Issues  53 


THE  TRUST  OVERSHADOWS  ALL  ISSUES 

(July,  1902.) 

THAT  the  Trust  would  sooner  or  later  be  the  great  issue 
in  American  politics  I  have  never  once  doubted  for 
the  last  fifteen  years.  My  surprise  to-day  is,  not  that 
it  has  suddenly  become  so  important  an  issue,  but  that  it  has 
been  so  long  about  it. 

In  1884  I  was  managing  director  of  the  Kiyerside  Eolling 
Mill  Co.,  of  Cincinnati,  Ohio.  The  price  of  iron  that  year 
was  steadily  falling,  and  the  end  of  things  seemed  in  sight. 
If  we  wished  to  sell  our  iron  we  had  to  meet  a  market  that 
had  already  forced  us  to  manufacture  at  less  than  cost,  and 
there  appeared  to  be  no  prospect  of  future  improvement. 
There  was  certainly  no  way  that  we  could  lower  the  cost  of 
producing,  for  we  bought  our  ore  and  coal  at  the  lowest 
market  price,  and  our  day  labor  received  a  wage  that  only 
too  obviously  admitted  of  no  reduction.  The  men,  indeed, 
were  already  on  the  verge  of  starvation,  except  our  skilled 
labor,  which  was  paid  upon  the  scale  of  the  Amalgamated 
Iron  Workers,  and  that  allowed  us  no  option  about  reduction. 
We  had  either  to  pay  the  scale  or  shut  up  shop. 

I  was  young  in  business  in  those  days,  fresh  from  Harvard 
College,  and  I  used  to  wonder  how  long  the  world  could  get 
along  on  the  basis  of  everybody  losing  money.  For,  after 
finding  out  that  there  was  nothing  in  the  iron  business,  I 
naturally  looked  into  other  lines  of  manufacture,  and  saw 
that  my  own  was  in  no  exceptional  condition.  Every  manu- 
facturer that  I  talked  with,  in  fact,  had  the  same  story  to 
tell  of  the  impossibility  of  making  a  living  with  the  existing 
low  prices,  and  I  finally  became  so  discouraged  with  the  out- 
look that  I  made  up  my  mind  the  only  thing  to  produce,  that 
seemed  to  be  sure  of  a  market  at  a  standard  price,  was  gold. 
When  you  get  your  ounce  of  gold  it  is  always  worth  your 
twenty  dollars,  and  this  sort  of  a  business  seemed  infinitely 


54  Socialism  Inevitable 

better  than  iron  manufacturing,  where  the  price  of  the  prod- 
uct steadily  fell  below  that  originally  expected. 

It  is  true  that  Mr.  Rockefeller  and  his  Standard  Oil  Trust 
had  already,  even  in  that  early  day,  shown  how  to  prevent 
over-production  and  get  a  fixed  price  for  the  product,  but  I 
did  not  see  how  I  could  ever  wait  long  enough  for  the  iron 
men  to  get  sense  enough  to  follow  Mr.  Rockefeller's  example. 
It  is  well,  too,  that  I  did  not  wait.  It  took  those  iron  manu- 
facturers eighteen  years — from  1884  to  1902 — to  do  what 
they  should  have  had  the  sense  to  have  done  at  once.  Indeed, 
how  they  ever  managed  to  survive  those  eighteen  long  years  has 
been  a  great  surprise  to  me,  although  I  know  that  it  is  not 
four  years  since  a  good  many  of  them,  who  are  now  on  "easy 
street"  through  the  formation  of  the  Morgan  Trust,  were  on 
the  verge  of  bankruptcy. 

While  I  was  investigating  gold  mining  prospects,  which, 
by  the  way,  did  not  prove  to  be  particularly  rosy,  because  the 
uncertainty  of  one's  product  fully  offsets  the  certainty  of  the 
selling  price,  I  happened  to  be  thrown  by  a  fractious  horse 
in  the  mountains  of  California,  and  suffered  a  broken  jaw. 
Although  I  was  not  an  "agitator"  in  those  days,  nevertheless 
I  felt  my  jaw  an  important  enough  member  of  my  ego  to 
justify  a  trip  to  Southern  California  to  allow  it  an  oppor- 
tunity to  consolidate — to  form  a  little  trust  of  its  own,  so 
to  speak.  While  there,  the  real  estate  boom  came  on,  and  at 
last  I  saw  an  opportunity  of  buying  something — land — which 
looked  as  if  it  would  sell  at  a  profit ;  hence  I  gave  up  my  deter- 
mination to  go  in  for  gold  mining  and  became  a  real  estate 
shark. 

The  results  were  only  fairly  satisfactory.  For  a  year  or 
two  it  was  possible  to  buy  land  and  sell  it  at  a  considerable 
profit;  then  the  boom  busted,  and,  so  far  as  I  could  see,  the 
problem  of  selling  for  more  than  cost  was  as  impossible  of 
solution  as  ever,  unless  one  could  form  a  trust.* 

This  was  in  1888.  Since  then  there  have  been  ups  and 
downs  in  business,  but  principally  "downs"  for  most  men, 
and  the  "downs"  had  the  game  all  to  themselves,  apparently, 
until  after  McKinley's  first  election,  when  the  Cuban  war 
stirred  up  trade  so  much  by  the  destruction  of  property,  and 
the  consequent  demand  for  goods  of  all  kinds,  that  the  "ups" 
have  been  very  much  in  evidence  ever  since. 


The  Trust  Overshadows  All  Issues  55 

A  little  prosperity,  however,  has  not  made  them  blind  to 
the  advantages  a  trust  has  in  making  assurance  doubly  sure. 
If  we  had  not  had  the  war,  the  trusts  would  have  been  formed 
as  a  matter  of  absolute  necessity.  As  it  is,  they  may  pos- 
sibly be  regarded  more  as  a  matter  of  expediency,  although  I 
think  most  of  the  insiders  in  the  trusts  to-day  would  admit 
that  in  forming  their  trusts  they  had  only  forestalled  an 
inevitability. 

Now  I  think  that  my  experience  in  business  since  the  year 
1884  is  more  or  less  typical  of  that  of  other  business  men 
in  America.  We  all  realize  that  the  only  way  to  make  money 
is  to  get  into  a  monopoly,  and  if  that  cannot  be  done  then 
the  best  thing  is  to  stay  out  of  business.  But  there  happen  to 
be  so  many  people  who  must  make  a  living  somehow,  people 
who  neither  get  into  a  trust  nor  stay  out  of  business,  that 
there  is  considerable  dissatisfaction  in  the  land  among  these 
outsiders.  They  may  be  very  inconsiderate  to  pester  us  so 
with  their  weeping  and  wailing;  but  we  must  take  men  as 
they  are. 

Men  are,  primarily,  and  above  everything  else,  eating 
animals;  and,  after  all,  an  animal  is  simply  an  intelligent 
automobile,  carrying  around  an  ever  hungry  stomach.  If 
they  cannot  obtain  food  they  are  sure  to  make  unpleasant 
remarks;  and  if  to  feed  themselves  it  is  necessary  to  own  a 
trust,  and  there  are  not  enough  trusts  to  go  around,  then 
those  who  get  left  are  sure  to  become  ill-natured  and  generally 
troublesome. 

Now  it  so  happens  in  the  trust  lottery  that  the  fellows 
who  draw  blanks  are  so  far  in  the  majority  that  if  it  came 
to  a  matter  of  voting  there  is  not  the  remotest  doubt  who 
would  win.  But  while  the  winners  of  the  trust  prizes  are 
few  in  number,  they  make  up  for  this  paucity  in  brains,  and 
they  also  know  enough  to  hire  other  brains  to  do  some  of  their 
thinking  for  them.  What  they  are  mortally  afraid  of  just 
now  is  that  the  business  men  who  are  fated  to  draw  blanks 
will  object  to  the  entire  system  of  play;  hence  the  main 
object  of  the  winners  is  to  persuade  the  losers  to  continue 
in  the  game  by  feeding  them  with  fairy  stories  of  how,  by 
some  change  in  the  rules,  they  will  yet  be  able  to  win  back 
their  losses. 

At  the  present  stage  of  the  game,  it  is  the  capitalists  that 


56  Socialism  Inevitable 

have  been  squeezed  by  the  trusts,  who  are  dissatisfied ;  while 
the  workingmen  are  largely  disinterested  onlookers.  It  is 
true  that  the  Beef  Trust  has  attracted  considerable  criticism 
by  the  high  price  of  beef,  and  many  workingmen  who  have 
hitherto  regarded  the  Trust  problem  as  one  simply  of  academic 
interest,  with  no  immediate  application  to  their  daily  life, 
have  suddenly  sat  up  and  taken  notice.  However,  the  price 
of  beef  will  fall,  or  wages  will  adapt  themselves,  and  that 
episode  will  prove  to  be  simply  an  accidental  note  in  the  song 
of  monopoly.  The  merchants  and  manufacturers,  on  the 
other  hand,  who  have  lost  their  power  to  conduct  an  inde- 
pendent competitive  business  alongside  of  the  Trust,  are 
naturally  up  in  arms  against  an  invasion  which  threatens 
their  commercial  existence.  Thus,  when  the  Trust  problem 
is  represented  as  overshadowing  all  other  issues,  what  is 
really  meant  is  that  the  smaller  capitalists,  who  are  vastly 
in  the  majority,  are  demanding  legislation  to  curtail  the 
growth  of  monopoly. 

So  far  in  the  United  States  political  issues  have  merely 
been  clashes  between  the  different  interests  of  the  capitalists. 
It  is  true  that  the  interest  of  the  workingman,  and  of  the 
country  as  a  whole,  has  always  been  the  ostensible  interest  of 
both  parties,  but  this  has  only  been  a  mask  used  for  the  pur- 
pose of  gaining  votes.  For  instance,  take  the  tariff  issue. 
The  manufacturers  wanted  a  high  tariff  to  increase  their 
profits,  but  they  said  they  wanted  it  in  order  to  pay  higher 
wages.  On  the  other  hand  the  farmers  wanted  a  low  tariff 
so  as  to  reduce  the  cost  of  the  various  commodities  they  re- 
quired, but  they  said  they  wanted  it  because  the  lower  prices 
would  enable  the  workingmen  to  buy  the  necessities  of  life, 
including  farm  products. 

So,  to-day,  the  smaller  capitalists  want  the  trusts  crushed 
because  otherwise  they  themselves  will  be  crushed.  Yet,  as 
it  would  never  do  to  go  before  the  country  with  such  a  purely 
selfish  cry,  a  demand  for  the  legislative  protection  of  their 
own  particular  class,  they  add  such  reasons  for  the  aboli- 
tion of  the  Trust  as  they  think  will  appeal  to  the  work- 
ingmen and  the  country  at  large. 

First,  they  say  the  Trust,  by  holding  a  complete  monopoly 
of  the  essentials  of  life,  is  placing  the  whole  nation  at  its 
mercy. 


The  Trust  Overshadows  All  Issues  57 

Second,  by  reason  of  the  undoubted  economies  that  the 
Trust  has  introduced  in  the  production  of  goods,  it  is  threat- 
ening the  working  class  with  a  huge  unemployed  problem. 

Of  course  both  these  indictments  are  correct,  but  what  I 
wish  to  call  attention  to  is  that  the  smaller  capitalists  would 
never  have  considered  either  the  "country  as  a  whole,"  or  the 
working  class  in  particular,  had  it  not  been  that  their  own  in- 
terests were  in  jeopardy  and  required  outside  aid. 

I  am  not  blaming  them  for  this.  It  was  a  perfectly  natural 
proceeding.  Men  are  not  expected  to  attend  to  other  people's 
interests;  they  are  usually  too  busy  looking  after  their  own. 
However,  just  as  these  same  smaller  capitalists  could  never  be 
induced  to  take  action  until  the  Trust  had  actually  compelled 
them  to  look  financial  death  in  the  face,  so  the  working  class 
will  delay  taking  action  until  they  are  placed  in  the  same 
relative  position.  The  appeal  to  the  working  class  to  rally 
to  the  support  of  the  smaller  capitalists  will  therefore  be  in 
vain.  The  workingman  will  continue  to  vote  as  in  the  past 
until  an  economic  condition  presents  itself  directly  to  him 
that  will  compel  his  attention. 

Judging  from  the  following  editorial,  the  Detroit  Tribune 
thinks  that  such  a  condition  has  already  presented  itself. 

THE  ALARM  OF  LABOR  IS  NATURAL. 

Trust  control  of  any  industry  means  the  application  of  trust 
methods.  Trust  method  means  the  systematic  elimination  of 
every  item  of  cost  that  can  be  dispensed  with.  It  means  the 
substitution  of  cunning  mechanism  for  human  handiwork  as  far 
as  possible.  It  means  the  substitution  of  women  and  children  for 
men  in  every  department  where  men  can  be  thus  displaced.  It 
means  a  reduction  of  prices  just  to  the  exact  point  that  will 
squeeze  out  competition.  Then  follows  absolute  control  of  price 
and  product. 

A  case  that  is  very  much  in  the  public  eye  is  that  of  the  Brown 
cigar  factory.  It  was  operated  under  a  system  by  which  young 
girls  became  competitors  of  men  in  cigar  making.  Their  product 
went  out  in  competition  with  that  of  skilled  laborers.  Now  an- 
other step  is  being  taken  which  will  multiply  the  effectiveness 
of  the  trust  operative.  The  displacing  of  a  certain  number  of  girls 
from  their  employment  in  a  given  factory  is  the  lesser  evil, 
although  that  is  bad  enough  for  those  who  are  dependent  upon 
such  employment  and  are  the  support  or  partial  support  of  a 
family.  Trust  control  must  by  its  constant  reduction  in  the  cost 
of  production  seriously  affect  the  independent  factories  and  their 
workmen  who  make  a  specialty  of  hand  work.   It  is  possible  that 


58  Socialism  Inevitable 

the  future  of  such  Industries  may  not  be  as  bad  as  it  looks,  but 
the  operatives  cannot  be  blamed  for  exhibiting  serious  alarm 
for  their  jobs  and  hostility  to  the  new  system. 

Overlooking  the  complacent  manner  in  which  the  Tribune 
regards  a  system  which  forces  girls  to  support  their  families 
as  a  perfectly  natural  and  satisfactory  one,  and  the  inference 
that  anything  which  tends  to  prevent  the  perpetuation  of  such 
a  system  must  be  viewed  with  abhorrence,  I  would  deny  the 
general  proposition  that  the  working  class,  as  a  class,  are 
ready  to  take  any  decided  stand  against  the  Trust  in  its 
present  stage  of  development.  I  say  this  simply  because  the 
unemployed  problem  is  not  aggravated  sufficiently  to  induce 
any  considerable  part  of  them  to  think.  The  capitalist's 
political  brains  are  found  in  his  pocket-book;  the  working- 
man's  are  in  his  stomach. 

The  capitalist,  indeed,  finds  the  trusts  emptying  his  pocket- 
book.  I  have  been  warning  him  that  this  event  was  sure  to 
happen,  warning  him  for  fifteen  years  or  more,  but  he  would 
never  listen.  In  fact  even  now  that  the  money  is  actually 
going,  while  he  is  objecting  strenuously  enough,  he  has  hardly 
yet  come  to  listen  to  the  advice  I  offer  him.  He  still  wishes 
to  destroy  the  trusts :  I  tell  him,  Let  the  Nation  Own  the 
Trust.  This,  of  course,  is  too  radical  a  solution  for  him  to 
adopt,  although,  judging  from  the  editorials  in  the  Hearst 
papers  demanding  the  National  Ownership  of  trusts,  I  should 
judge  that  the  tide  is  setting  pretty  strong  in  that  direction. 

Mr.  Hearst,  indeed,  has  too  much  good  newspaper  sense 
to  run  very  far  ahead  of  public  opinion.  His  aim  is  to 
give  his  readers  such  ideas  as  he  thinks  are  in  commercial 
demand,  albeit  he  usually  selects  the  more  radical  kind.  I, 
on  the  other  hand,  give  my  readers  the  kind  of  ideas  they 
ought  to  like.  I  am  like  a  temperance  barkeeper,  who,  when 
a  customer  asks  for  whiskey,  puts  him  off  with  ginger  ale. 
This  is  not  usually  a  good  commercial  policy,  and,  in  fact, 
is  so  unheard  of  that  when  Mr.  Madden  refused  me  the  use  of 
the  United  States  mails  to  disseminate  my  own  hand-made 
ideas  instead  of  the  ordinary  ones  manufactured  in  quantities 
for  the  general  newspaper  trade,  he  had  the  endorsement  of 
President  Eoosevelt  and  of  the  whole  tribe  of  American  poli- 
ticians, together  with  the  daily  press. 

In  the  meantime,  while  the  small  capitalist  is  shilly-shally- 


The  Trust  Overshadows  All  Issues  59 

ing  with  the  Trust  problem,  allowing  President  Roosevelt  to 
fool  him  with  ridiculous  actions  in  the  United  States  Supreme 
Court,  and  at  the  same  time  praying  to  the  workingman  to 
come  to  his  aid,  the  latter  is  beginning  to  study  the  problem 
from  his  own  standpoint.  The  promise  made  by  the  small 
capitalist  is  that  the  waste  of  labor  engendered  by  this  going 
back  to  the  methods  of  production  on  a  small  scale  will  be 
sure  to  make  his  labor  much  more  in  demand  than  at  present. 
If  he  destroys  the  Trust  he  will  have  good  wages  and  a 
steady  job. 

That  there  is  something  in  this  argument  cannot  be  denied, 
as  there  was  in  the  logic  of  the  hand-weavers  who,  in  1838, 
tried  to  destroy  the  machinery  that  was  taking  away  their 
livelihood.  The  proposition,  viewing  it  politically,  is  simply 
this,  "Can  there  be  a  sufficient  number  rallied  in  support  of 
a  movement  to  prevent  economic  development  Y*  If  not,  then 
the  movement  must  proceed.  And  since  the  increase  in  the 
use  of  machinery  has  never  yet  been  stayed  because  men  were 
thrown  out  of  employment  by  its  use,  there  is  no  reason  why 
the  future  should  differ  from  the  past.  A  boy  may  wish  to 
remain  a  boy,  but  he  grows  into  a  man  all  the  same. 

I  have  referred  to  the  steady  process  of  economic  evolution 
finally  forcing  the  working  class  into  a  very  pronounced  atti- 
tude on  the  question  of  the  trusts,  but  the  stage  at  which  this 
event  will  occur  is  not  during  a  period  of  so-called  prosperity 
such  as  we  are  now  enjoying.  It  will  come  during  a  time  of 
depression,  which  may  be  expected  just  as  soon  as  the  demand 
for  new  machinery  has  so  decreased  that  the  demand  for 
labor  to  build  such  machinery  falls  off  sufficiently  to  create 
an  unemployed  problem.  The  Trust  presages  that  such  a 
condition  is  rapidly  approaching. 

Now  the  Trust  is  primarily  a  device  on  the  part  of  the 
capitalist  to  prevent  price-cutting  as  the  result  of  overproduc- 
tion, which,  in  turn,  is  caused  by  the  competitive  wage  system 
limiting  wages  to  approximately  what  it  costs  the  working- 
man  to  live.  We  have,  by  the  use  of  machinery,  largely 
augmented  the  product  of  the  workingman,  but  he  has  shared 
hardly  at  all  in  this  increased  productivity.  The  increase 
has  gone  direct  to  the  capitalist,  who  uses  it  in  the  production 
of  still  more  machinery,  until  he  finds  himself  with  more  than 


GO  Socialism  Inevitable 

he  can  use,  and  is  compelled  to  form  a  trust  to  prevent  over- 
production. 

The  first  economic  effect  of  the  Trust  is  to  force  the  sur- 
render of  other  manufacturing  capitalists  engaged  in  the  same 
line  of  production;  the  next  point  of  attack  is  the  capitalists 
engaged  in  distributing  its  products.  For  instance,  the 
American  Tobacco  Trust  first  captured  most  of  the  competing 
establishments  manufacturing  tobacco.  After  that  it  went 
after  the  wholesalers  and  jobbers  and  forced  them  to  abandon 
handling  any  competitive  brands.  By  this  means  it  forced 
the  surrender  of  those  recalcitrant  competitive  manufacturing 
establishments  who  would  not  surrender  on  direct  assault. 
They  were  starved  out  by  a  siege.  Their  market  was  cap- 
tured by  simply  blocking  the  avenue  by  which  they  sold  their 
goods  and  derived  their  profits. 

It  is  thus  seen  that  the  first  people  to  rise  up  in  arms 
against  the  Trust  are  naturally  those  first  attacked,  namely, 
the  smaller  competing  manufacturers,  and  the  distributive 
establishments, — capitalists,  and  not  workingmen.  These, 
I  repeat,  are  the  men  who  are  now  doing  most  of  the  howling, 
and  from  them,  very  largely,  comes  the  cry  for  workingmen 
in  particular,  and  the  public  in  general,  to  rush  to  their  aid 
and  destroy  the  Trust  in  order  that  they,  the  capitalists,  may 
live. 

When  the  people  do  not  respond  with  that  alacrity  which  they 
supposed  they  would  show,  these  small  fry  capitalists  throw 
up  their  hands  to  heaven  and  cry  that  the  country  is  "going 
to  destruction" ;  in  short,  they  confuse  their  own  petty  inter- 
ests with  those  of  the  country  at  large. 

We  can  well  dispense  with  these  little  capitalists,  and  even 
with  the  jobbers  and  wholesalers,  and,  as  a  nation,  suffer  no 
permanent  harm,  for  it  is  the  usual  process  of  nature  to 
eliminate  the  unnecessary.  Years  ago  the  farmer  cried  that 
the  middle  man  must  go.  He  is  going.  However,  the  day 
will  come,  and  it  is  rapidly  approaching,  when  the  Trust  will 
say  to  the  working  class,  "You  have  built  up  the  manufac- 
turing plants  of  this  country  to  such  an  extent  and  io  such 
perfection  that  we  do  not  require  your  services  to  build  any 
more,  and  we  do  not  require  many  of  you  to  operate  those 
already  built,  so  automatic  has  your  ingenuity  made  them.'* 


The  Trust  Overshadows  All  Issues  61 

Then  may  we  expect  the  working  class  at  last  to  awaken  to 
the  real  significance  of  the  Trust. 

Hence,  the  workingman  will  vote  for  the  Public  Ownership 
of  trusts  only  when  lack  of  employment  will  force  him  to  do 
so.  In  like  manner  the  smaller  capitalists  made  no  move 
when  they  simply  had  the  theory  of  the  Trust  expounded  to 
them :  they  had  to  see  the  Trust  actually  throttling  them  be- 
fore they  could  realize  their  danger.  Why  should  the  working 
class  be  any  clearer  sighted  than  those  capitalists?  There 
is  no  reason  to  expect  it.  They,  too,  will  decline  to  move 
until  conditions  drive  them  to,  and  the  only  hope  I  have  of 
seeing  any  concerted  movement  from  them  in  the  near  future 
is  simply  that  I  foresee  conditions  where  they  will  have  but 
one  chance  of  escaping  starvation  from  an  unemployed  prob- 
lem. That  chance  will  be  the  adoption  of  the  Co-operative 
Wage  System,  Public  Ownership  of  the  Trusts  and  Means  of 
Production. 


62  Socialism  Inevitable 


A  PROPHECY  OF  1891 

(August,  1902.) 

(An  excerpt  from  my  preface  to  the  American  edition  of 
the  Fabian  Essays,  published  by  the  Humboldt  Publish- 
ing Co.,  of  New  York,  in  June,  1891.) 

TO  the  American  readers  of  these  essays,  it  may  prove  a 
matter  of  surprise  to  learn  that  English  Socialists 
find  in  the  United  States  the  most  pronounced  eco- 
nomic phenomena,  which,  to  their  eyes  at  least,  seem  to  prog- 
nosticate the  near  approach  of  the  coming  social  revolution. 
I  refer  to  the  trusts. 

It  may  be  remarked,  however,  that  while  they  consider  the 
Trust  as  a  symptom  that  the  competitive  system  is  in  its 
last  throes,  they  wait  for  the  appearance  of  similar  industrial 
combinations  to  stir  Englishmen  to  a  revolt;  whereupon 
Americans,  as  if  to  square  the  account  of  "76,  are  to  learn 
revolution  from  their  trans- Atlantic  cousins. 

By  "revolution"  is  to  be  understood,  of  course,  not  violence, 
but  a  complete  change  of  system;  and  by  "revolutionists/' 
those  who  advocate  such  a  complete  change.  As  Lassalle 
reminded  us  years  ago,  trifling  reforms  may  be,  and  often  have 
been,  accompanied  by  excessive  bloodshed,  while  revolutions 
have  worked  themselves  out  in  the  profoundest  tranquility. 

It  seems  to  be  typical  of  all  social  revolutionists  that,  no 
matter  how  much  patriotism  may  be  decried  as  mere  racial 
selfishness,  their  national  pride  invariably  asserts  itself  when- 
ever the  discussion  arises  as  to  which  nation  will  take  the 
lead  in  throwing  off  the  shackles  of  capitalism. 

The  Fabian  essayists  certainly  make  out  a  strong  case  in 
England's  favor ;  the  Germans  point  with  pride  to  the  million 
and  a  half  votes  polled  by  the  Socialists  at  the  last  election 
for  the  Keichstag;  France,  the  mother  of  revolutions,  sings 
the  Marseillaise;  Belgians  ask  but  for  universal  suffrage  to 
show  the  world  what  they  will  do  in  the  way  of  revolution, 


A  Prophesy  of  1891  63 

and  I,  as  an  American  Socialist,  put  forth  my  patriotic  plea 
that  my  own  country  bids  fair  to  rank  first  in  the  inauguration 
of  Industrial  Democracy. 

There  is  one  point,  however,  upon  which  I  think  all  Social- 
ists are  agreed,  namely,  that  it  is  one  and  the  same  golden 
chain  that  fetters  the  proletariat  of  all  nations;  and  that 
the  weakest  link  in  that  chain  is  the  measure  of  the  strength 
of  the  present  social  system.  Snap  but  one  link  in  any 
country,  and  at  the  same  moment  the  proletariat  of  the  world 
are  free. 

The  social  revolution,  when  it  does  come,  must  undoubtedly 
be  international,  though  resting  for  a  period,  perhaps,  upon 
national  Socialism.  Imagine,  for  instance,  that  on  gaining 
universal  suffrage,  Belgium's  proletariat  should  expropriate 
the  capitalists  and  inaugurate  a  successful  co-operative  com- 
monwealth. Is  it  possible  to  conceive  that  workingmen  of 
all  nations  would  not  make  a  successful  demand  for  the  es- 
tablishment of  a  like  social  system  in  their  own  respective 
countries  ?  Moreover,  the  general  industrial  condition  of  the 
great  nations  is  approximately  the  same.  All  complain  of 
over-production;  all  are  vainly  trying  to  solve  the  question 
of  the  unemployed;  all  show  a  like  tendency  to  great  social 
change;  and  in  all  the  great  capitalists,  crushing  out  their 
smaller  rivals,  and  concentrating  wealth  into  fewer  and  fewer 
hands,  are  the  true  progenitors  of  the  revolution. 

Now  the  American  people,  the  nation  that  certainly  fur- 
nishes the  best  educational  facilities  for  demonstrating  the 
advantages  of  the  concentration  and  crystallization  of  capital, 
should  naturally  and  logically  be  the  first  to  strike  for  eco- 
nomic freedom.  To-day,  in  the  United  States,  there  are 
50,000  people,  out  of  a  population  of  more  than  sixty-three 
millions,  who  own  practically  everything  worth  having,  while 
there  are  four  men,  viz.,  Gould,  Astor,  Vanderbilt,  and  Kocke- 
feller,  who,  in  a  large  measure  control,  and,  what  is  more 
important  are  rapidly  absorbing,  the  wealth  of  this  50,000. 
The  day  is  not  so  very  far  distant,  and  a  sociologist  can  pre- 
dict almost  its  exact  appearance,  just  as  an  astronomer  calcu- 
lates the  date  of  an  eclipse  of  the  sun,  when,  if  no  structural 
change  in  society  takes  place,  these  four  men  will  be  the  sole 
owners  of  the  United  States.  I  think  that  if  such  a  state  of 
affairs  should  come  about,  no  one  will  differ  with  me  when  I 


64  Socialism  Inevitable 

say  that  it  would  force  a  reconstruction  of  society.  In  other 
words,  the  sixty  odd  millions  of  people  may  now  rest  undis- 
turbed, and  allow  a  plutocracy  of  50,000  to  own  their  country; 
but  when  it  shall  come  to  having  only  four  own  it,  patience 
will  cease  to  be  a  virtue. 

That  the  tendency  of  the  wealth  of  the  United  States  is 
to  concentrate  into  larger  and  larger  masses,  held  by  a  con- 
stantly diminishing  number  of  capitalists,  is  not  disputed 
by  anyone  at  all  familiar  with  the  statistics  of  the  case.  This 
process  continued  and  followed  to  its  logical  conclusion  must 
lead  inevitably  to  Socialism.  If  Gould  &  Co.  are  not  to  own 
the  railways  and  telegraphs,  the  land  and  machinery,  there 
can  be  but  one  possible  successor,  viz.,  the  people,  as  repre- 
sented by  the  government. 

The  only  possible  chance  of  retarding  the  approach  of 
Socialism  is  to  stop  the  tendency  of  capital  to  congeal  in  a 
few  hands.  Some  plan  must  be  devised  to  prevent  Gould 
and  Vanderbilt  gobbling  up  more  railways;  to  keep  Astor's 
hands  off  city  lots,  and  to  check  Rockefeller's  insatiable  and 
omnivorous  appetite  for  industrial  plants.  Now  it  requires 
but  slight  intelligence  to  comprehend  that  neither  a  high  nor 
a  low  tariff,  nor  free  trade,  would  appreciably  effect  Vander- 
bilt's  income;  and  fiscal  legislation,  whether  it  takes  the 
form  of  the  free  coinage  of  silver,  lending  money  on  crops, 
or  increasing  paper  money  until  the  circulation  is  $50  or 
even  $5,000  per  capita — all  this  will  never  divert  the  Pac- 
tolian  stream  which  flows  into  Mr.  Gould's  golden  reservoir. 

Even  the  nationalization  of  the  railways  and  telegraphs, 
although  proposed  as  a  reactionary  measure  calculated  to  en- 
able farmers,  by  obtaining  lower  freight  rates,  to  increase 
their  margin  of  profit  sufficiently  to  hold  their  own  as  inde- 
pendent producers,  would,  if  put  into  effect,  but  precipitate 
the  very  event  which  it  is  hoped  to  retard.  For  the  govern- 
ment ownership  of  railways,  it  is  well  to  remember,  would 
involve  the  payment  of  several  thousand  million  dollars  to  the 
present  owners,  all  of  which  must  seek  reinvestment.  Senator 
Carlisle's  objection,  however,  based  upon  the  difficulty  of 
raising  the  money  for  such  a  purchase  is  trivial,  the  credit 
of  the  United  States  being  good  enough  to  float  bonds  for 
many  times  the  amount  required,  although  the  purchase  at 
their  present  fancy  valuation  of  watered  stocks  would  be 


u 


A  Prophesy  of  1891  65 

utterly  unwise  and  unnecessary.  The  main  difficulty  in  order 
to  avoid  a  great  unemployed  problem,  as  stated,  would  be  for 
the  present  owners  to  find  a  safe  and  profitable  place  to  re- 
invest the  thousands  of  millions  of  dollars  received  in  ex- 
change for  their  railways,  and  the  channels  for  the  profitable 
investment  of  such  a  large  amount  of  money  are  certainly  not 
visible.  It  could  not  be  spent  in  building  new  oil  refineries, 
as  Mr.  Eockefeller,  of  the  Standard  Oil  Trust,  is  armed  with 
statistics  to  prove  that  there  are  too  many  oil  refineries  already. 
The  same  blockade  against  the  entrance  of  fresh  capital  into 
the  sugar  refining  is  also  sure  to  be  encountered,  as  Mr. 
Havemeyer,  of  that  trust,  says  that  he  is  compelled  to  shut 
down  part  of  the  refineries  already  in  existence,  to  prevent 
the  unprofitable  over-production  which  would  otherwise  ensue. 
That  there  is  absolutely  no  chance  to-day  to  invest  any  con- 
siderable amount  of  capital  in  building  new  machinery  of 
production  in  the  United  States,  is  a  palpable  truism  with 
financiers,  and  the  only  remaining  opening  would  be  to  pur- 
chase existing  plants,  which  would  simply  be  shifting  the 
investment  problem  from  one  capitalist  to  another,  and 
usually  from  the  large  capitalist  to  the  small  one. 

The  nationalization  of  the  railways  in  the  United  States 
would  therefore  mean  the  immediate  expropriation  of  all 
small  capitalists  by  the  big  ones.  If  Gould,  Vanderbilt  & 
Company  cannot  own  railways,  they  will  invest  their  money, 
both  principal  and  income,  in  flour  mills,  gas  works,  cotton 
factories,  etc.,  and  the  former  owners  of  those  industries  will 
soon  be  enlisted  in  the  ranks  of  the  proletariat  under  the 
banner  of  Socialism.  That  is,  the  nationalization  of  the 
railways  could  not  possibly  be  effected  without  causing  the 
crystallization  of  all  capital  invested  in  the  other  industries 
in  the  hands  of  such  a  comparatively  small  number  of  owners' 
hat  the  advent  of  Socialism  would  be  almost  instantaneous. 

The  problem  of  giving  work  to  the  unemployed,  although 
not  at  present  a  threatening  one  in  the  United  States,  is 
destined  soon  to  become  one  of  the  utmost  importance.  There 
are,  at  present,  according  to  Carroll  D.  Wright's  governmental 
statistics,  an  average  of  over  one  million  able-bodied  men  in 
the  United  States  willing,  yet  unable,  to  find  employment. 
The  pressure  of  these  upon  the  ranks  of  the  employed  effectu- 
ally prevents  wages  rising  above  the  point  of  mere  subsistence. 


66  Socialism  Inevitable 

Hence  the  very  fact  that  we  have  such  a  vast  and  fertile 
territory,  and  such  ingenious  labor-saving  machinery,  to- 
gether with  an  industrious  and  intelligent  population,  tends 
to  make  the  problem  of  the  unemployed  but  the  more  threat- 
ening, since  these  very  elements  only  conduce  to  an  enormous 
product  per  capita,  with  no  corresponding  methods  of  dis- 
tribution. The  old-time  argument,  that  our  great  farming 
population,  with  its  members  all  owning  their  own  homes, 
would  always  prove  an  insuperable  barrier  to  Socialism  in 
the  United  States,  is  completely  out  of  date  nowadays,  since 
the  greater  part  of  our  farmers  are  already  proletarians, 
while  the  few  that  still  own  their  own  farms  are  hopelessly 
in  debt,  and  even  now  are  demanding  the  most  Socialistic 
measures,  such  as  national  warehouses  for  grain,  and  the 
nationalization  of  railways. 

Considering  how  near  at  hand  is  the  great  social  metamor- 
phosis, I  would  earnestly  advise  the  reader  of  these  exceed- 
ingly clever  and  able  essays  to  give  them  the  deepest  thought. 
They  express  clearly  the  nature  of  the  crisis  through  which 
we  are  now  passing,  a  crisis  in  which  none  who  well  under- 
stands it  can  fail  to  be  vitally  interested.  We  are  now  swing- 
ing on  the  hinge  of  destiny,  we  are  in  the  transition  stage  of 
the  greatest  sociologic  event  that  history  has  yet  recorded. 
Let  him  who  runs,  read. 


The  Tkue  Joy  or  Life  67 


THE  TRUE  JOY  OF  LIFE 

(September,   1902.) 

THERE  is  but  one  true  Elixir  of  Life,  and  that  is  to  live. 
A  great  many  people  think  they  live  when  in  reality 
they  are  letting  their  bodies  and  souls  undergo  a  pro- 
cess of  decay.  Some  who  are  sure  they  are  living  are  simply 
burning  themselves  up.  Really  to  live  and  be  respectable 
under  modern  conditions  is  possible  but  for  a  favored  min- 
ority— favored  either  by  heredity  or  environment,  or  both, — 
and  of  these  there  are  but  a  fraction  who  take  advantage  of 
their  possibilities.  The  difficulties  of  steering  a  career  be- 
tween eminent  respectability  and  disgraceful  dissipation  are 
so  great  that  few  escape  wrecking  their  souls. 

Now,  the  very  first  requisite  of  respectability  is  to  conform 
your  thoughts  and  actions  to  those  of  the  community  among 
whom  you  happen  to  be  thrown.  A  buried  corpse  conforms 
to  its  surrounding  soil,  and  finally  becomes  undistinguishable 
from  the  soil  itself.  It  is  the  soil.  A  buried  acorn,  on  the 
other  hand,  is  a  thing  of  life  because  it  refuses  conformity, 
and  becomes  the  glorious  oak.  The  dead  man  is  always 
respectable;  the  live  man  never,  if  he  really  lives.  On  the 
other  hand,  it  is  just  as  fatal  to  dissipate  or  burn  up  your 
energies  in  leading  a  life  which  the  respectable  call  disre- 
putable, as  it  is  to  deaden  yourself  by  the  life  that  the  dis- 
reputable sneer  at  as  "respectable." 

To  live  is  simply  to  express  yourself — physically  and  spir- 
itually. You  cannot  live  if  you  do  not  express  yourself,  and 
you  are  not  expressing  yourself  when  you  think,  speak  and 
act,  not  in  your  own  way,  but  after  the  manner  of  some  one 
else — because  it  is  respectable. 

We  live  for  the  sake  of  experiencing  emotions.  Every 
natural  movement  of  the  mind  or  body  gives  us  a  pleasur- 
able sensation,  and  it  is  only  when  we  are  unable  to  exercise 
our  functions  properly  and  normally  that  the  ungratified 
desires  lead  to  the  use  of  narcotics  or  stimulants.    A  man 


68  Socialism  Inevitable 

working  all  day  in  a  dismal  coal  mine,  and  denied  the  sight 
of  the  beauties  of  nature,  develops,  unconsciously  perhaps,  an 
intense  longing  for  the  sight  of  trees  and  grass  and  flowers 
and  sunshine.  But  he  cannot  satisfy  that  longing:  to  sup- 
port life  he  must  stay  in  the  mine.  Is  it  then  any  wonder 
that  he  craves  whiskey,  which  would  in  a  measure  substitute 
the  sensations  that  his  nature  so  imperatively  demands? 
Granted  that  the  exhilaration  caused  by  the  whiskey  is  alto- 
gether of  a  baser  kind  than  that  induced  by  the  sight  of  a 
green  field,  it  does,  at  least,  take  the  man  away  from  himself 
and  his  environment,  an  effect  that  seems  a  psychological 
necessity  to  those  living  unnatural  lives. 

It  is  well  enough  for  the  man  whose  everyday  life  seems 
a  dream  in  the  eyes  of  the  miner,  to  berate  the  latter  for  his 
drunkenness;  but  he  should  bear  in  mind  that  the  only  time 
the  miner  ever  feels  that  he  is  living  is  when  he  can  escape 
his  actual  environment  by  so  deadening  his  nerves  with 
whiskey  that  reality  becomes  subordinate  to  an  imaginary 
condition. 

We  universally  excuse  a  man  for  permitting  himself  to 
be  drugged  when  he  is  about  to  undergo  a  surgical  operation, 
and  if  whiskey,  instead  of  ether,  were  used  for  the  anaesthetic, 
no  one  would  think  of  censuring  him.  Moreover,  for  weeks 
after  the  operation,  the  man  may  be  in  pain,  but  we  do  not 
frown  upon  his  taking  opium.  Let  him  recover,  however, 
and  then  take  opium  or  whiskey  to  rid  himself  of  a  spiritual 
pain,  and  we  at  once  regard  him  with  scorn,  notwithstanding 
the  general  admission  that  his  suffering  may  be  greater  than 
that  of  any  mere  physical  ailment.  It  is  natural  for  man 
to  shrink  from  pain,  or,  if  he  cannot  escape  the  pain  itself,  to 
do  the  next  best  thing — deaden  himself  to  the  sensation. 

A  healthy  man  in  a  natural,  healthful  environment  will 
never  think  of  narcotizing  himself.  He  will  not  wish  to 
lose  any  of  his  sensations — any  of  his  life.  When  a  man 
goes  to  the  opera,  he  certainly  does  not  take  a  sleeping  potion 
beforehand.  On  the  contrary,  he  wants  to  be  fully  alive  in 
order  to  enjoy  every  moment.  Nor  could  you  think  of  a  man 
wishing  to  get  drunk  in  heaven.  It  is  an  absurdity.  Yet  if 
he  happened  to  be  in  hell,  who  would  blame  the  poor  fellow 
for  getting  as  drunk  as  he  could,  and  staying  that  way  as 
long  as  his  satanic  host  would  furnish  the  high-balls?    The 


The  True  Joy  of  Life  69 

true  course  of  the  temperance  reformer  is  to  make  this  world 
so  little  like  hell  and  so  nearly  like  heaven  that  no  one  will 
dare  get  drunk  for  fear  of  missing  part  of  the  show. 

And  it  must  always  be  remembered  that  a  heaven  on  this 
earth  implies  something  for  us  to  do,  some  task  to  perform 
that  we  feel,  and  know,  is  useful  to  ourselves  and  to  mankind 
in  general.  We  cannot  enjoy  a  full  life  by  plowing  the  sands. 
Digging  post  holes  and  filling  them  up  again  may  exercise 
our  muscles,  but  it  is  deadly  to  the  soul.  Conjugating  Greek 
verbs  and  never  getting  any  further  in  the  language  may  be 
excellent  intellectual  discipline,  but  it  would  never  make  a 
scholar.  To  enjoy  digging  the  post  holes  we  must  know 
that  they  are  to  be  filled  by  posts,  and  that  the  fence,  or 
whatever  it  may  be,  is  something  that  performs  a  useful 
function.  We  can  take  pleasure  in  the  study  of  Greek  verbs 
only  when  we  know  that  it  will  lead  to  the  enjoyment  of 
Greek  literature. 

It  is  the  uselessness  of  the  sports  of  the  rich  that  poisons 
them.  Young  Vanderbilt  feels  this  when  he  runs  a  stage 
coach  for  hire.  To  drive  a  coach  and  four  every  day  up  and 
down  the  pike  without  "paying  passengers"  becomes  monoton- 
ous, but  let  the  driver  know  that  every  man  has  paid  for  his 
seat,  and  immediately  there  is  added  a  sense  of  usefulness  to 
the  coach  driving  that  gives  it  the  zest  and  flavor  of  life. 
When  we  have  reorganized  society  it  is  quite  true  that  the 
demand  for  useful  labor  to  produce  the  necessities  of  life 
will  be  extremely  small.  At  the  outside  two  hours  a  day  will 
give  every  man  all  needed  food,  shelter  and  clothing.  Men 
will  not  use  champagne  and  cigars,  because  they  will  not 
wish  to  deaden  their  senses  in  a  world  of  love  and  beauty, 
nor  will  there  be  any  incentive  to  the  individual  ownership  of 
expensive  things,  since  such  ownership  to-day  is  desired  only 
for  the  sake  of  ostentation,  a  motive  that  will  entirely  dis- 
appear with  the  effacement  of  a  system  which  enables  one  man 
to  take  the  wealth  produced  by  another. 

But  while  the  demand  for  necessities  will  be  immeasurable, 
architecture,  the  greatest  of  arts,  will  consume  men's  labor 
and  time  to  an  unparalleled  and  unimaginable  extent.  Such 
buildings  as?  we  have  seen  at  the  World's  Fair  will  be  con- 
structed on  a  far  grander  scale,  and  of  permanent  material, 
in  every  State  in  the  Union,  built  not  only  for  the  joy  of 


70  Socialism  Inevitable 

seeing  them  after  completion,  but  for  the  actual  pleasure  of 
building  them  We  know  how  the  cathedrals  of  the  middle  ages 
were  erected  by  singing  workmen.  If  they  sang  and  loved 
their  work  in  those  days,  how  much  more  will  labor  in  the 
future  enjoy  its  work  when  mankind  is  filled  with  that  con- 
sciousness of  universal  goodwill  which  can  come  only  when 
all  men  are  brothers,  and  join  in  the  great  work  of  making 
life  beautiful? 

Not  till  the  race  has  developed  into  a  complete  and  world- 
wide organism  will  the  individual  really  live.  Then  and  only 
then  will  man's  heart  throb  in  unison  with  the  heart-beats 
of  all  humanity, 


Two  Would  Conquerobs  71 


TWO  WORLD  CONQUERORS 

(September,    1902.) 

ALEXANDEE  sighed  when  he  had  no  more  worlds  to 
conquer,  but  when  Morgan  completes  his  conquest,  the 
world,  not  he,  will  do  the  sighing.  It  will  sigh  be- 
cause it  will  be  unemployed.  Such  is  the  difference  between 
the  achievements  of  the  two  men,  and  a  mighty  big  differ- 
ence it  is,  let  me  remark. 

If  Alexander  had  not  overeaten  at  that  famous  dinner,  and 
so  died  of  indigestion,  he  might  easily  have  served  out  his 
allotted  time  of  life.  The  dinner  was  an  accident.  There 
was  no  need  of  his  gorging  himself  to  death;  he  might  have 
lived  as  abstemiously  as  John  D.  Kockefeller,  that  is,  had  he 
possessed  a  modern  liver.  But  men  did  not  have  livers  in 
those  heroic  days,  and  so  Alexander  had  to  die  an  ignominious 
death.  We  have  learned  something,  however,  in  the  last  few 
thousand  years.  Thanks  to  Bernarr  Macfadden,  we  now  eat 
only  when  we  are  hungry,  that  is,  if  we  have  the  sense  and  the 
cents — for  we  must  have  both. 

Alexander  had  to  f ufil  but  one  condition  to  hold  his  throne ; 
he  had  to  keep  his  health.  In  fact,  this  was  about  the  one 
essential  in  feudal  days.  With  good  health  and  reasonable 
luck  and  intelligence,  most  kings  could  be  pretty  sure  of  keep- 
ing their  jobs. 

With  our  new  world-emperor,  Mr.  Morgan,  on  the  other 
hand,  it  is  not  a  question  of  health  but  of  wealth,  of  his  ability 
to  continue  making  money  at  his  job.  I  don't  mean  that 
Morgan  himself  would  abdicate  his  throne  if  he  found  there 
were  nothing  "in  it."  I  mean  that  Morgan  to-day  holds  his 
sceptre  by  reason  of  his  ability  to  give  employment  both  to 
men  and  capital,  or,  to  be  more  correct,  because  of  the  fact 
that  such  employment  results  in  profit.  For  Morgan  does 
not,  and  cannot,  create  industrial  conditions.  He  simply 
takes  advantage  of  the  conditions  as  they  exist  in  the  indus- 
trial world,  and  it  so  happens  to-day  that  labor  and  capital 


72  Socialism  Inevitamli; 

can  be  reasonably  well  employed;  hence  Morgan's  reign  of 
peace.  He  came  to  his  throne  because  of  a  great  over-produc- 
tion of  the  industrial  machinery  of  the  United  States  which 
necessitated  the  formation  of  vast  combinations  of  railways 
and  industrial  enterprises.  Morgan,  as  a  great  banker,  was 
called  in  by  the  capitalists  to  conduct  the  formation  of  these 
combinations.  The  war  with  Spain  coming  on,  and  after- 
wards the  Boer  War,  caused  a  great  demand  for  commodities, 
which  was  followed  up  by  a  corresponding  increase  in  price. 
The  new  Morgan  combinations  not  only  profited  directly  by 
all  this,  but  succeeded  in  effecting  vast  economies  in  produc- 
tion, thus  still  further  augmenting  profits. 

Profits  certainly  never  amounted  to  such  a  prodigious  sum 
as  to-day  in  the  United  States.  Morgan's  Steel  Trust  is  earn- 
ing at  the  rate  of  nearly  $140,000,000  a  year.  The  -result  of 
all  this  prosperity  is  naturally  being  followed  up  by  vast 
expenditures,  so  as  to  perfect  still  further  the  machinery  of 
production  and  profit-making.  One  railway  company  alone, 
the  Pennsylvania,  is  about  to  expend  $100,000,000  in  better- 
ments. 

This,  however,  cannot  last  indefinitely.  The  day  is  fast 
approaching  when  the  greater  part  of  the  work  of  perfecting 
the  machinery  of  production  will  be  finished.  The  Pennsyl- 
vania tunnel  under  the  Hudson  Kiver  will  cost  $60,000,000 ; 
but  certainly  no  one  can  think  that  when  it  is  finished  that 
there  will  be  immediate  need  of  another  tunnel  or  of  widen- 
ing the  one  just  built.  And  even  the  wildest  imagination 
can  hardly  dream  of  a  third  tunnel  being  built  in  the  near 
future. 

It  is  the  same  with  the  immense  amounts  of  money  now 
being  spent  in  improvements  upon  our  railway  systems. 
Heavier  bridges  and  heavier  rails  are  the  order  of  the  day. 
But  when  the  new  rails  are  laid  and  the  bridges  strengthened 
it  will  be  years  before  they  will  wear  out. 

That  the  business  men  of  this  country  do  not  look  for  an 
indefinite  continuation  of  good  times  is  seen  in  the  market 
price  of  the  preferred  stock  of  the  United  States  Steel  Com- 
pany. Here  is  Schwab  in  an  affidavit  valuing  the  assets  at 
more  than  thirteen  hundred  million  dollars  and  claiming  that 
the  earnings  for  the  year  will  be  more  than  one  hundred 
and  forty  millions,  whereas  the  fixed  charges  are  less  than 


Two  World  Conquerors  73 

sixteen  millions.  Notwithstanding  all  this,  the  seven  per  cent, 
preferred  stock  of  the  company  sells  for  less  than  ninety 
cents,  while  our  United  States  bonds  paying  two  per  cent,  sell 
for  108. 

The  only  possible  reason  for  a  seven  per  cent,  selling  below 
a  two  per  cent,  investment  is  because  of  the  uncertainty  of 
the  former  being  permanent.  Yet,  according  to  Mr.  Schwab, 
the  only  chance  of  the  Steel  Company  failing  to  pay  its  seven 
per  cent,  would  be  an  almost  inconceivable  demoralization  in 
the  iron  industry  of  the  country.  And  the  low  price  of  steel 
stock,  to  my  mind,  indicates  exactly  such  a  feeling  of  uncer- 
tainty and  foreboding  in  the  minds  of  the  investing  public. 
Even  the  "gift"  of  $4,000,000  a  year,  in  the  form  of  increased 
wages  paid  by  the  Trust,  has  not  to  any  measurable  extent 
reassured  the  public  mind.  One  thing  it  does  show,  however, 
is  that  Schwab  is  a  man  of  discernment.  He  saw  that  he 
would  sooner  or  later  be  forced  to  give  higher  wages,  owing 
to  the  increased  cost  of  living,  and  simply  took  time  by  fhe 
forelock;  and  so  by  anticipating  the  men's  demands,  gets 
credit  for  great  philanthropy.  If  he  had  waited  for  a  strike 
and  then  given  in,  he  would  have  shown  much  poorer  judg- 
ment. 

The  iron  industry  of  this  country  pays  the  railway  com- 
panies between  sixty  and  seventy  million  dollars  a  year  for 
transportation.  Now,  if  we  are  going  to  have  such  a  falling 
off  in  the  demand  for  iron  that  the  Steel  Trust  will  fail  to 
pay  dividends  upon  its  preferred  stock,  it  certainly  means  that 
a  great  part  of  the  millions  it  is  now  paying  the  railway  com- 
panies is  going  to  be  lost  to  them. 

The  collapse  of  the  steel  and  iron  industry,  therefore,  means 
the  collapse  of  the  railway  industry,  and,  in  fact,  of  practically 
all  the  industries  in  the  country.  I  am  predicting  this  by  my 
words,  but  our  capitalists  are  predicting  it  much  more  effec- 
tively, by  deeds,  when  they  refuse  to  buy  Steel  Trust  stock 
at  par.  This  is  the  pyramid  of  human  money  bags  upon 
which  Mr.  Morgan  is  perched  and  from  which  he  views  the 
world  as  his  own — the  ability  of  the  Steel  Trust  to  pay 
dividends. 

So  long  as  capitalists  want  steel  rail,  just  so  long  will  the 
Steel  Trust  employ  men  digging  iron  ore,  conveying  it  in 
vessels  and  trains  to  the  mills,  and  transporting  the  finished 


74  Socialism  Inevitable 

article  to  its  destination.  But  the  question  of  their  "wanting" 
steel  is  not  a  question  of  volition.  They  only  "want"  when 
there  is  a  demand,  and  this  demand  can  exist  only  when  there 
are  economic  conditions  which  create  such  a  demand.  It  is 
beyond  the  power  of  the  capitalists  to  create  "conditions"; 
they  may,  by  foresight  and  combination,  succeed  in  modify- 
ing conditions ;  but  the  general  current  of  industry,  under  our 
existing  competitive  system,  is  entirely  beyond  their  control. 

It  is  true  that  if  Mr.  Morgan  were  the  Director  General 
of  the  whole  of  the  world's  capital,  he  could  manage  better 
to  keep  things  going  until  all  the  world  were  perfectly 
equipped  with  the  latest  industrial  machinery.  But  with  this 
accomplished,  and  having  nothing  more  to  do  with  his  in- 
come, he  would  at  last  be  compelled  from  the  very  necessity 
of  things  to  introduce  the  co-operative  wage  system  to  get  rid 
of  his  money.  Morgan,  however,  is  not  in  complete  control 
of  the  world's  capital,  although  he  seems  rapidly  approaching 
it.  He  must  consider  other  competing  capitalists,  and  either 
husband  or  waste  his  capital  as  the  exigencies  of  the  com- 
petitive strife  demand. 

Morgan,  in  short,  is  not  a  free  agent,  although  freer  than 
any  capitalist  that  the  world  has  yet  seen.  Take  his  position 
in  the  industrial  world  to-day,  particularly  in  connection 
with  the  great  iron  industry.  He  is  the  whole  thing  from 
beginning  to  end.  He  controls  the  iron  ore,  the  vessels 
carrying  the  ore,  the  furnaces  making  the  ore  into  pig  iron, 
the  conversion  of  the  iron  into  steel,  the  rolling  of  the  steel 
into  beams  and  steel  rail.  He  not  only  controls  the  railways 
which  buy  the  steel  rail,  but  he  controls  the  great  companies 
which  use  steel  in  the  construction  of  buildings  and  steam- 
ships. In  fact,  he  performs  every  act  in  the  whole  scale  of 
industry  from  the  very  beginning  up  to  the  last  act  of  con- 
sumption. 

Nevertheless,  Morgan,  as  a  capitalist,  is  just  as  limited  in 
his  powers  of  consumption  as  Morgan,  the  individual,  is 
limited  in  his  powers  of  eating.  As  a  capitalist,  he  can  have 
indigestion  from  too  much  capital,  just  as  a  man  can  have  in- 
digestion from  too  much  food.  The  body  is  an  organism,  more 
or  less  perfect,  that  can  consume  only  so  much  food,  and  so 
the  body  politic,  whether  Morganized  or  simply  organized, 
can  consume  only  so  much  capital.    The  best  Morgan  can  do 


Two  World  Conquerors  75 

for  his  body  is  to  keep  it  well  organized  and  exercised,  and 
not  to  feed  it  either  too  much  or  too  little;  and  if  he 
could  perform  the  same  service  for  society  he  would  be  safe 
in  holding  his  throne  as  emperor  of  the  world. 

But  he  can't,  that  is,  unless  he  supplants  the  existing  com- 
petitive wage  system  by  the  co-operative  system;  and  this 
change  can  never  be  made  for  society.  It  must  be  made  by 
society  of  its  own  accord  and  motion,  for  itself.  A  man  may 
cultivate  the  soil  and  plant  a  rose  bush,  but  he  cannot  make 
it  blossom.  The  bush  must  do  that  for  itself.  All  the  gar- 
dener can  do  is  to  hasten  or  retard  the  event.  Now,  society 
is  simply  a  human  rose  bush,  with  somewhat  more  sense  than 
the  common,  or  garden  variety.  Morgan  is  only  a  part  of 
society  and  can  contribute  only  his  part  of  that  social  con- 
sciousness which  will  cause  us  to  know  that  some  day  we  are 
to  blossom  into  Socialism. 

Our  physical  body  may  be  described  as  an  organization  of 
living  cells.  Each  cell  looks  out  for  itself,  but  it  can  only  do 
so  by  helping  to  keep  the  whole  body  in  a  condition  of  health 
so  that  it  can  derive  its  proper  sustenance  from  it  in  turn 
for  the  sustenance  that  it  gives  the  body.  If  anything  goes 
wrong  with  a  cell, — for  instance,  if  the  cells  in  the  legs  be- 
come tired  by  too  much  walking, — they  first  give  a  civil 
warning  that  they  must  have  a  rest,  and  finally  if  they  don't 
get  what  they  want,  they  go  on  strike  and  won't  work  at  all. 
Then  the  body  must  come  to  their  relief.  Hence  the  cells 
occupy  the  position  of  the  coal  miners  in  society  to-day  who 
first  make  a  demand  and  then  finally  go  on  strike  to  get  what 
they  want.  Indeed,  if  they  had  the  sense  of  the  cells  in  the 
body  they  would  get  what  they  want  or  society  would  go  cold. 

The  latest  theory  of  cancer  is  that  it  is  simply  an  ordinary 
cell  that  has  gone  crazy  and  determined  to  set  up  a  little 
imperium  in  imperio  of  its  own.  It  wants  to  be  the  whole 
thing  itself.  It  levies  on  all  the  tissues  of  the  body  just  as 
if  it  had  the  right  to  claim  a  separate  organization  as  well 
as  the  body.  The  body  cannot  stand  this  rebellion.  It  finally 
weakens  under  the  stress  of  civil  war,  and,  unless  it  subdues 
the  cancer,  it  dies. 

The  Trust  is  a  cancer  on  the  body  politic.  It  is  an  organ- 
ization gone  wild  which  thinks  that  the  sustenance  intended 
for  the  whole  of  society  should  be  diverted  to  it.    At  one  time 


76  Socialism  Inevitable 

it  was  the  feudal  king  who  took,  to  himself  the  wealth  in- 
tended for  all,  but  to-day  it  is  the  money  king  who  usurps  the 
rights  of  society,  and  right  royally  he  does  it,  too ! 
As  Mr.  Wayland  says  in  the  Appeal  to  Reason: 

In  view  of  the  hesitation  in  the  world  of  stocks,  bonds  and 
gambling  occasioned  by  the  illness  of  the  English  king,  a  finan- 
cial report  says  that  while  the  king  was  more  ornamental  than 
vital,  'he  was  a  discreet  and  mute  partner  in  many  important 
enterprises.'  In  the  olden  times  the  king  raised  an  army  of  free- 
booters and  overrun  and  pillaged  his  neighbors  where  he  could, 
and  on  the  booty  thus  obtained  lived  in  luxury.  That  was  at 
least  open  and  in  a  sense  honorable.  He  made  no  pretense  to  be 
otherwise.  To-day  he  takes  the  ways  of  business  to  accomplish 
the  same  ends.  He  invests  in  'enterprises'  that  have  for  their 
object  the  taking  away  from  the  people  the  results  of  their  labor, 
and  appropriates  them  to  his  own  use.  He  and  his  fellows 
secretly  conspire  against  the  rest  of  the  human  race  to  cheat 
them  in  the  matter  of  price  and  cost,  and  extract  millions  from 
them  to  squander  on  idle  ostentatious  living.  The  king  is  a  mere 
child  in  this  to  such  as  Morgan:  combinations  of  men  steal  from 
the  people  a  tiny  speck  on  every  mouthful  of  sugar,  every  drop 
of  oil,  every  glimmer  of  electricity  or  gas,  every  mouthful  of 
food,  every  rag  of  clothes.  In  this  age  we  have  not  one  king,  but 
many,  and  many  whose  names  even  we  never  hear,  or  of  whose 
existence  we  are  unaware.  Stores  to-day  have  become  so  many 
tax-collecting  offices  for  the  men  who  own  the  trusts;  the  erst- 
while merchant  is  to-day  but  the  collector  in  the  cunning  system 
of  taxation  without  representation.  We  read  and  wonder  at  the 
stupidity  and  patience  of  the  past  generation  in  their  submission 
to  the  tribute  of  kings,  but  they  were  never  bled  to  one-tenth  the 
extent  the  people  are  to-day  by  commercial  kings,  whose  in- 
comes from  the  people  are  greater  than  any  England's  kings  ever 
dreamed.  We  could  better  support  five-fold  the  royalty  and 
snobbery  of  England  in  their  present  useless  lives  than  support 
the  tens  of  thousands  of  tax-collecting  vermin  that  swarm  the 
industrial  body  of  the  people.  What  we  pay  for  national  and 
local  taxes  is  nothing  compared  to  the  sums  we  have  laid  on  us 
each  year  by  the  lice  of  capitalism.  Go  to  any  city  and  see  the 
long  line  of  mansions,  palaces  and  exclusive  pleasure  places- 
inhabited  by  human  beings  who  never  do  a  useful  stroke  of  labor, 
whose  lives  are  spent  in  cunningly  extracting  from  the  workers 
the  honey  of  wealth  they  produce,  and  you  can  readily  see  how 
insignificant  the  public  taxes  are  compared  to  what  it  takes  to 
keep  up  these  drones.  The  income  of  a  Rockefeller  or  a  Morgan 
is  greater  than  the  royal  income  of  all  the  royal  families  of  all 
Europe. 

Yes,  it  is  true  that  no  feudal  king  ever  had  the  twentieth 
part  of  Rockefeller's  income,  and  it  is  precisely  owing  to  this 


Two  World  Conquerors  77 

enormous  drain  upon  the  people  that  capitalism  will  never 
have  the  long  life  enjoyed  by  feudalism.  It  is  on  the  same 
principle  that  a  man  can  endure  a  wart  on  his  body  much 
longer  than  a  cancer.  The  kings  and  dukes  were  mere  warts 
on  society :  the  Kockefellers  and  Morgans  are  virulent  cancers. 
The  wart  remains  in  nearly  a  static  condition.  It  grows 
very  slowly  and  draws  but  little  nourishment  from  the 
system.  Furthermore,  it  causes  little  pain  or  discomfort. 
Not  so  with  the  cancer.  It  grows  every  day,  and  the  older  it 
gets  the  more  it  drains  the  system,  and  the  greater  pain  it 
causes. 

Now,  when  a  man  has  a  cancer,  he  doesn't  expect  to  get 
rid  of  it  by  reasoning  with  the  cancer  and  persuading  it  to 
leave  his  body.  Not  at  all.  He  summons  up  his  resolution 
and  has  it  cut  out.  Nor  does  he  bear  any  resentment  against 
the  cell  which  has  gone  wild  and  now  threatens  his  life.  If 
he  is  a  scientist  he  knows  that  it  is  totally  irresponsible. 
It  is  simply  diseased,  and  if  properly  treated  and  put  in  a 
proper  environment,  will  once  again  resume  its  rightful  status 
in  the  body. 

The  Trust  cancer  upon  the  American  People  is  not  yet 
at  the  open,  virulent  stage.  It  gives  some  annoyance;  we  all 
know  that  an  abnormal  growth  is  upon  us;  but  we  will  not 
take  measures  for  its  removal  until  the  disease  assumes  the 
acute  form,  and  it  becomes  a  matter  of  life  and  death  with 
us  to  remove  the  false  growth  and  correct  the  tendencies  that 
brought  it  on. 


78  Socialism  Inevitable 


AN  INTERNATIONAL  OFFICE  SEEKER 

(November,   1902.) 

New  York,  Sept.  12th,  1902. 
Gaylord  Wilshire,  Esq. 

125  East  23d  Street,  New  York  City. 

Dear  Comrade: — The  undersigned  were  appointed  as  a  commit- 
tee to  notify  you  that  the  Social  Democratic  Party  Convention  of 
the  Tenth  Congressional  District  of  Manhattan,  held  on  Septem- 
ber 5th,  1902,  at  60  Second  avenue,  New  York  City,  unanimously 
nominated  you  as  candidate  for  Congress  of  the  Social  Demo- 
cratic Party  in  that  district.  The  nomination  was  made  in  the 
interest  of  the  Socialist  cause  which,  we  believe,  will  be  furthered 
by  your  candidacy,  and  this  we  submit  to  your  consideration  as 
the  chief  inducement  for  your  acceptance.  There  is  no  place  in 
this  country,  and,  therefore,  in  the  world,  where  a  Socialist  gain 
or  a  Socialist  victory  can  be  of  greater  consequence  to  Socialism 
than  in  New  York  City,  for  New  York  City  is  incontestably  the 
nervous  centre  of  the  United  States.  A  blow  struck  at  the 
capitalist  system  here  will  have  the  most  telling  effect.  A 
Socialist  victory  in  New  York  will  thrill  our  friends  the  world 
over  with  joy  and  fill  our  foes  with  dismay.  For  a  Socialist  who 
can  and  will  make  a  hard  fight,  such  a  victory  in  the  Tenth 
District  is  undoubtedly   possible. 

There  is  no  necessity  to  dwell  long  on  the  reasons  why  we 
have  chosen  you  for  our  standard  bearer.  For  many  years  you 
have  fought  for  the  cause  fearlessly  and  ably,  both  with  speech 
and  pen.  Your  name  needs  no  introduction.  It  has  become 
synonymous  with  Socialism.  All  who  know  you,  know  you  as 
a  true  comrade  in  the  Socialist  ranks  and  a  Royal  Socialist  in 
the  Socialist  movement. 

We  urge  you  to  accept  the  nomination  offered  to  you,  not  as 
a  favor,  but  in  the  interest  of  Socialism. 

We  remain, 

Fraternally  yours, 

Herman  Reich,  et  al.,  Committee.* 


*  Socialist  Party  is  the  name  of  the  political  organization  of 
the  Socialists  in  the  United  States,  but  owing  to  technical  reasons 
which  existed  at  that  time  in  New  York  State,  the  name  Social 
Democratic  Party  was  used  instead  of  Socialist  Party. 


An  International  Office  Seeker  79 

1  THINK  I  must  certainly  be  classed  as  the  Champion 
International  Peripatetic  Office  Seeker. 
Here  I  am  again  running  for  office  in  New  York  City, 
for  of  course,  I  accepted  the  above  invitation.  Nobody  ever 
refuses  a  nomination  for  office  unless  it  be  the  Vice-Presidency. 
Only  six  months  ago  I  was  worrying  the  Canadian  public 
by  seeking  election  to  Parliament.  Eighteen  months  pre- 
viously I  was  running  for  Congress  in  California,  this  being 
my  second  offence  there,  as  I  had  done  the  same  thing  twelve 
years  ago.  Ten  years  ago,  moreover,  I  ran  for  the  office  of 
xlttorney  General  of  New  York,  and  eight  years  ago  I  stood 
as  a  Parliamentary  candidate  in  Manchester,  England.  Let 
him  who  can,  challenge  this  record ! 

Of  course,  I  always  entered  as  a  Socialist,  and,  needless 
to  say,  I  was  always  successful,  although  never  elected. 

We  Socialists  don't  run  for  office  primarily  to  get  elected. 
We  go  into  politics  for  the  educational  advantages  of  a 
Socialist  campaign.  The  elections  give  us  an  excuse  to  talk, 
and  so  excite  the  interest  of  the  people  sufficiently  that  they 
listen  much  more  readily  to  what  we  have  to  say.  The  mere 
power  to  act,  even  if  never  exercised,  will  always  incline  the 
possessor  to  consider  a  possible  action,  whereas  if  he  were 
powerless  he  would  be  dead  to  our  appeals. 

There  is  only  one  day  in  the  year  when  the  American 
people  have  any  power,  and  that  is  Election  Day.  For  all 
the  use  they  ever  make  of  it,  of  course,  they  might  just  as 
well  never  have  it ;  but  you  don't  cut  off  a  baby's  legs  because 
he  doesn't  use  them  the  first  month,  and  it  would  be  equally 
silly  to  say  that  our  right  to  vote  is  useless  because  we  have 
not  yet  the  sense  to  use  it.  I  am  simply  one  of  the  nurses 
teaching  the  American  Voting  Baby  how  to  use  his  Voting 
Legs.  I  am  trying  to  induce  him  to  struggle  out  of  the 
Slough  of  Poverty,  in  which  he  is  now  mired,  up  to  the 
Table  Land  of  Universal  Wealth  and  Happiness. 

If  we  go  far  enough  back  in  the  development  of  man  we 
will  find  that  our  ancestors  had  their  origin  in  the  water, 
for  there  was  a  time  when  there  was  no  land,  and,  conse- 
quently, no  land  animals.  When  the  waters  receded  and  the 
land  appeared,  moreover,  there  was  no  wild  rush  of  water 
animals  to  leave  the  water  and  live  on  dry  land,  just  as  there 
is  none  to-day,    There  was  a  steady  warfare,  however,  among 


80  Socialism  Inevitable 

the  aquatic  inhabitants,  some  of  which  were  at  times  obliged 
to  crawl  out  on  the  land  to  escape  those  enemies  that  were 
unable  to  follow  them,  much  as  flying  fish  nowadays  leave 
the  sea  for  a  flight  in  the  air  to  escape  their  foes.  These 
first  chaps  did  not  venture  on  the  land  because  they  liked  it 
better;  on  the  contrary  I  have  no  doubt  that  they  felt  quite 
like  the  typical  fish  out  of  water.  But  it  was  dry  land  or 
death,  and  they  chose  the  lesser  of  the  two  evils. 

We  are  therefore  land  animals  to-day,  not  because  our 
remote  ancestors  deliberately  decided  that  land  was  a  pleas- 
anter  abode  than  water,  but  simply  because  they  had  no  other 
choice  if  they  wanted  to  be  ancestors.  And  man  is  like  the 
rest  of  all  living  creatures — he  seldom  moves  unless  he  must. 
When  the  puddle  dries  up,  the  tadpole  must  take  to  the 
land  and  be  a  froggy  or  he  will  die  in  the  mud,  and  never  live 
to  "a-wooing  go." 

Nevertheless,  all  the  frogs  in  the  world  might  croak  their 
lungs  out  in  praise  of  land  over  water,  without  persuading 
one  young  tadpole  to  leave  until  the  time  comes.  And  while 
I  admit  that  I  am  simply  the  bullfrog  on  the  bank  singing 
to  the  tadpole  in  the  pool,  yet  it  is  just  as  useless  to  convince 
me  of  the  futility  of  such  singing,  as  to  argue  with  a  bull- 
frog as  to  the  futility  of  croaking.  It's  a  stunt  that  froggy 
and  I  like  to  do,  quite  irrespective  of  any  apparent  result. 

But  perhaps  neither  song  is  as  useless  as  it  seems.  Even 
if  the  tadpole  will  not  leave  the  pool  until  its  legs  commence 
to  sprout,  no  one  can  tell  how  much  influence  the  frog's 
song  may  have  had  in  hastening  that  sprouting.  The  mind 
controls  the  body  of  frogs  as  well  as  of  men.  But  it  may 
likewise  be  said  that  the  body  controls  the  mind.  If  you  cut 
off  a  tadpole's  tail  he  will  live  all  right,  but  he  never  becomes 
a  frog.  His  legs  never  develop,  nor  does  his  mind.  He  lives 
and  dies  a  tadpole.  It  is  the  same  with  a  man.  If  you  cut 
off  the  opportunities  for  his  physical  development,  at  the 
same  time  and  in  almost  a  like  degree,  you  cut  off  his  pos- 
sibilities for  intellectual  development.  It  is  therefore  most 
important  that  in  the  education  of  our  children,  our  little 
human  tadpoles,  we  give  them  a  full  chance  for  physical 
development,  that  is,  if  we  expect  an  intellectual  development. 
And  if  we  expect  a  spiritual  and  moral  development  we  must 
have  an  intellectual  development. 


'An  International  Office  Seeker  81 

For  the  soul's  sake  we  must  let  our  legs  have  a  chance  to 
grow.  Here  in  New  York  we  send  our  children  to  schools 
having  badly  ventilated  and  poorly  lighted  rooms,  and  worse 
than  all,  very  often  without  playgrounds,  and  we  look  for 
a  crop  of  souls !  If  I  had  my  way  I  would  give  every  school- 
house  a  whole  block  for  a  playground,  and  devote  two-thirds 
of  the  time  now  almost  wasted  on  the  children's  minds  to 
the  development  of  their  bodies.  A  child  with  a  good  physique 
may  have  a  good  brain  and  be  a  useful  citizen.  A  child 
with  no  physique  will  be  useless  even  if  it  has  a  good  brain. 

When  I  began  this  article,  however,  I  had  no  idea  of  dis- 
coursing upon  either  evolution,  psychology,  mental  science, 
education  or  physical  culture.  I  simply  wished  to  say  that 
I  felt  somewhat  like  the  bullfrog  on  the  bank  calling  on  the 
little  tadpoles  in  the  pool  to  come  out  of  the  slime  and  enjoy 
the  air  and  sunshine.  I  know  they  can't  come  until  they  are 
ready,  but  I  am  equally  aware  that  they  must  have  the  wish 
to  come.  I  am  therefore  trying  to  inspire  my  fellow  Ameri- 
cans with  the  wish  to  get  out  of  the  slime  of  the  Marsh  of 
Poverty.  If  I  can  show  them  the  possibility  of  another  and 
happier  life,  they  will  wish  for  such  a  life.  They  will  also 
struggle  for  it,  and  vote  for  it.  The  wish  is  father  to  the 
deed. 

I  know  that  the  American  Voting  Tadpoles  are  now  about 
ready  to  drop  their  competitive  tails  and  put  on  their  co- 
operative legs.  They  are  physically  and  intellectually  ready 
for  such  a  change,  and  all  that  is  needed  is  to  show  them 
that  the  Bank  of  Socialism  is  at  hand  for  them  to  climb 
upon,  and  that  the  climbing  is  easy.  Of  course,  as  the  waters 
evaporate  under  the  fierce  blasts  of  monopoly,  there  is  coming 
a  time,  when  they  will  be  forced  to  come  out,  for  if  they 
wait  too  long  there  may  be  such  a  sudden  drying  up  of  the 
puddles  that  some  of  them  will  perish  in  the  mud.  My 
mission  is  to  get  them  out  of  the  pool  and  into  the  air,  before 
it  is  too  late. 


83  Socialism  Inevitable 


JANE  ADDAMS— ARTIST 

(December,  1902.) 

WHILE  in  Chicago  last  month,  I  had  the  pleasure  of 
meeting  Miss  Jane  Addams,  and,  incidentally,  of 
seeing  her  creation,  Hull  House.  I  am  sure  that  if 
every  one  felt  as  I  do,  the  great  artists  would  have  little  time 
for  work,  for  their  lives  would  be  one  long,  tiresome  ex- 
hibition of  themselves  rather  than  of  their  creations.  For, 
to  me,  the  artist  is  always  so  much  greater  than  his  work, 
that  I  never  care  for  the  latter  if  I  can  study  the  former. 
Fortunately,  however,  all  men  are  not  of  my  mind,  and  artists 
are  allowed  to  exhibit  themselves  in  other  shapes  than  flesh 
and  blood. 

One  of  the  ways  that  Miss  Addams  has  thus  had  time  in 
which  to  express  herself  is  in  the  bricks  and  mortar  of  Hull 
House,  and  in  the  society  she  has  gathered  there  to  carry  out 
her  program. 

In  styling  Miss  Addams  an  artist,  and  a  great  one,  too,  I 
do  not  wish  the  unthinking  to  gather  that  she  paints  pictures. 
When  one  says  an  artist, "without  explanation,  this  is  usually 
what  is  thought  to  be  meant;  but  of  course  it  is  a  mistake. 
An  artist  is  one  who  precipitates  ideal  forms  upon  mankind. 
He  may  work  on  a  canvas  with  paints, — a  painter;  he  may 
work  on  his  body, — an  actor;  he  may  simply  work  upon  so- 
ciety,— an  agitator.  Miss  Addams  may  be  &  worker  in  paints, 
she  is  a  worker  in  mankind. 

The  success  of  the  artist  depends  upon  the  success  with 
which  he  presents  his  ideal;  and  the  grander  the  ideal  and 
the  more  successfully  it  is  presented,  the  greater  the  artist. 
Now  the  Socialist,  having  to  mould  into  his  scheme  the 
material  of  human  society,  if  not,  indeed,  of  the  whole  universe, 
certainly  has  the  grandest  ideal  that  it  is  possible  for  a  human 
mind  to  conceive.  Yet  he  becomes  an  artist  only  when  he 
presents  this  ideal  in  such  tangible  shape  that  the  world  may 
see  beauties  which  have  hitherto  existed  hidden  in  his  mind. 


Addams,  Jane — Artist  83 

I  may  have  a  picture  of  a  horse  in  my  mind's  eye  quite  equal 
to  any  that  Kosa  Bonheur  ever  put  upon  canvas;  but  until  I 
can  precipitate  this  conception  upon  canvas  I  am  not  an 
artist. 

The  personality  of  the  artist  is  attractive  on  account  of  the 
reciprocity  existing  between  the  creator  and  the  creation.  An 
artist  cannot  create  a  work  of  art  without  enriching  his  own 
soul  as  much,  subjectively,  as  he  has  enriched  the  soul  of  the 
world  objectively.  Hence  the  world  cannot  reward  the  artist, 
for  his  reward  comes,  not  only  in  the  joy  of  creation,  but  in 
the  contemplation  of  his  own  soul,  which  he  sees  embodied 
in  his  work.  A  work  of  art  is  a  mirror  reflecting  the  artist's 
soul  to  the  world  in  general  and  to  himself  in  particular. 

The  artist  focalizes  the  ideals  of  a  people.  If  they  have 
inharmonious  social  relations  their  ideals  are  shattered,  and 
no  great  works  of  art  can  be  produced  as  would  be  possible 
in  a  more  perfect  society. 

I  have  this  morning's  Toronto  World  in  my  hand,  and 
notice  the  following  item : 

Athens,  Oct.  27th. — The  beautiful  broken  bronze  statue  of  Mer- 
cury which  was  found  at  the  bottom  of  the  sea  near  the  Island 
of  Anticythera,  south  of  Cape  Matapan,  in  the  spring  of  1901, 
has  been  pieced  together  by  M.  Andre,  a  French  expert.  The 
task  has  been  performed  with  skill,  and  it  is  difficult  to  believe 
that  the  statue  was  reconstructed  from  numerous  fragments. 

It  is  rather  more  than  life  size,  and  is  of  the  finest  Greek 
workmanship.  It  is  considered  to  rival  the  exquisite  marble 
Mercury  of  Praxiteles,  which  was  found  at  Mount  Olympus  in 
1877  and  which  has  hitherto  been  deemed  the  most  beautiful 
statue  in  the  world.  Apart  from  its  singular  beauty  it  has  a 
peculiar  value  as  being  the  only  extant  example  of  an  undoubted 
original  bronze  statue  of  the  fourth  century  before  Christ. 

I  wonder  if  it  has  never  struck  many  people  with  wonder — 
especially  those  who  boast  of  the  material  progress  of  the 
Twentieth  Century — that  when  it  comes  to  art  we  cannot  chip 
out  a  single  statue  having  the  glory  of  a  little  pieced-together 
Mercury  fished  out  of  the  sea,  where  it  has  lain  for  more  than 
two  thousand  years.  Here  we  have  the  marble,  the  tools — 
pneumatic  chisels  if  need  be — the  leisure,  the  desire,  and  even 
the  artists,  but  we  cannot,  with  all  our  work,  get  results  that 
were  mere  play  to  the  Greeks.  It  is  simply  because  our  artists 
have  no  audience.  They  have  no  artistic  society  to  stimulate 
them.     When  Praxiteles  worked  he  felt  the  applause,  the 


84  Socialism  Inevitable 

cultivated  applause,  of  all  the  Greek  nation,  saturated  to  its 
heart  with  a  love  for  beauty.  To-day  a  few  of  us  think  we 
enjoy  beautiful  things,  and  more  pretend  to  enjoy  them;  but 
most  of  us  have  never  had  a  chance  even  to  realize  that  beauty 
exists. 

The  Greek  society  was  healthy,  a  society  in  which  all,  except 
the  slaves,  who  were  ignored,  had  a  pleasurable  part  to  play. 
The  differences  in  individual  fortunes  were  not  such  that  the 
mass  of  society  was  continually  at  the  verge  of  starvation 
while  a  few  had  so  much  wealth  that  they  did  not  know  what 
to  do  with  it.  Moreover  they  were  continually  at  war  with 
other  nations  and  had  come  to  feel  the  absolute  necessity  of 
being  interested  in,  and  caring  for,  each  other's  welfare  if 
they  wished  to  preserve  their  own.  For  though  war,  in  itself, 
is  inartistic,  it  has  been  the  main  factor  in  the  past  in  the 
welding  together  of  society,  which,  of  course,  was  a  necessary 
preliminary  to  the  era  of  Art. 

However,  I  am  a  long  time  in  coming  to  my  point  regarding 
Miss  Addams  and  her  art,  and  certainly  did  not  intend  taking 
in  Athens  when  I  began  to  speak  of  Chicago. 

Miss  Addams  is  trying  to  form  the  nucleus  of  an  Art  Center 
in  Chicago,  and  while  from  a  certain  point  of  view  her  task 
is  an  absolutely  hopeless  one,  considering  the  hostility  of  the 
environment,  nevertheless  there  is  a  phase  of  her  work  that 
perhaps  may  justify  it.  We  would  hardly  think  of  trying  to 
make  hell  cooler  by  dropping  snowballs  into  it,  and  yet  if  the 
devil,  or  his  friends  there,  ever  happened  to  be  struck,  he 
might  be  led  to  see  the  desirability  of  reducing  the  tempera- 
ture. On  a  hot  day  a  man  finds,  possibly  by  accident,  that 
waving  a  palm  leaf  makes  him  more  comfortable.  He  invents 
the  palm-leaf  fan;  later  on  he  calls  electricity  to  his  aid  and 
has  the  electric  fan,  and  someday  he  will  cool  his  house  in 
summer  as  he  now,  Baer  willing,  heats  it  in  winter.  Man 
must  first  have  the  wish  for  a  thing  before  he  can  get  it ;  and 
he  will  not  wish  for  it  until  he  has  reason  to  know  that  its 
possession  is  both  pleasurable  and  possible. 

The  Chicago  proletariat  would  all  want  the  beautiful  life 
that  Miss  Addams  presents  to  them  in  Hull  House  as  a  pos- 
sibility, if  they  could  see  it.  But  the  trouble  is  that  there  are 
but  a  few  that  ever  do  see  it,  and  even  they  have  no  practical 
plan  presented  to  them  for  >ttafnlng  it. 


Addams,  Jane — Artist  85 

This  endeavor  of  Hull  House  to  open  up  a  better  life  to 
the  poor  is  apparently  largely  dependent  upon  the  re-establish- 
ment of  primitive  industries  in  Chicago :  the  making  of  pottery 
and  weaving  of  cloth  by -hand,  and  the  sale  of  such  goods  to 
rich  people  who  have  a  fancy  for  them,  and  can  afford  to  pay 
hand  labor  to  make  an  article  that  a  machine  will  turn  out 
for  about  one  per  cent,  of  the  cost,  and,  in  the  eyes  of  most 
people,  a  superior  article  at  that. 

Now  I  do  not  wish  to  create  the  impression  that  a  gifted 
woman  like  Miss  Addams  values  such  a  work  except  as  it 
leads  to  the  desire  for  those  social  conditions  which  will  enable 
all  of  us  to  make  what  we  please  for  the  joy  of  making.  My 
only  difference  with  her  is  as  to  means: — whether  the  time, 
money  and  talent  she  is  devoting  to  Hull  House  could  not  be 
used  to  a  greater  advantage  in  another  way  to  attain  the  same 
result.  We  simply  differ  as  to  the  best  means :  our  end  is  the 
same — the  Kingdom  of  God  on  Earth? — — — * —       *■ — — 


86  Socialism  Inevitable 


WHY  SAVE  MEN'S  SOULS 

^_  (December,  1902.) 

THERE  was  a  time  when  talking  about  saving  souls  was 
ever  wearisome  to  me.  It  seemed  such  a  useless  thing 
to  talk  of  saving  the  souls  of  men  whose  bodies  gave 
no  sign  of  possessing  any  souls  worth  the  saving,  even  when 
granted  that  they  had  souls  to  save.  On  the  other  hand, 
I  had  to  admit  that  there  really  existed  no  incentive  to  save 
men's  bodies  if  they  had  no  souls  to  make  it  worth  while. 
But  later,  when  I  came  to  see  that  it  was  a  mathematical 
certainty  that  the  bodies  were  going  to  be  saved,  I  began  to 
consider  the  soul  of  man. 

The  bodies,  of  a  certainty,  are  going  to  be  saved.  Man's 
increasing  control  over  natural  forces  will  finally  cause  the 
earth  to  produce  such  a  vast  quantity  of  wealth,  that  it  will 
finally  overflow  any  dam  that  men  may  erect  in  the  vain 
attempt  to  make  it  artificially  scarce,  in  order  that  the  pos- 
sessors of  it  may  hold  the  non-possessors  in  subjection.  A 
dam  across  a  mill-stream  is  of  value  only  when  there  is 
neither  too  little  or  too  much  water.  It  is  just  as  necessary 
that  there  be  a  waste-way,  as  that  there  be  a  fall.  When  the 
stream  is  so  full  that  the  whole  surrounding  country  is  at 
flood,  the  power  of  the  dam  is  gone. 

Air  is  just  as  useful  to  man  as  food,  but  it  has  no  value 
since  it  may  be  had  for  the  breathing.  When  food  becomes 
as  plentiful  and  as  easy  to  obtain  as  air,  it  will  be  equally 
valueless ;  but  that  does  not  mean  that  it  will  become  useless. 
Man  will  still  eat  and  breathe. 

However,  on  the  day  that  food  loses  its  value  because  all 
may  have  it  in  plenty,  on  that  day  men's  bodies  will  be  saved, 
and  the  earth  will  become  peopled  by  a  healthy,  strong,  and 
beautiful  race.  It  will  be  as  impossible  for  men  to  be  un- 
healthy and  ugly — the  words  are  synonymous — as  for  a  herd 
of  wild  deer  in  the  forest  to  be  unhealthy  or  ugly.  Then  the 
earth  will  sing  with  joy  and  beauty. 


Why  Save  Men's  Souls?  87 

But  granting  that  it  will  thus  sing,  why  should  I  be  inter- 
ested in  hastening  the  day  of  song?  Not  because  of  any 
hope  that  I,  individually,  shall  be  either  a  participant  or  a 
spectator.  I  have  such  hope,  of  course, — for  the  day  when 
food  will  be  as  plentiful  as  air  is  near  at  hand, — but  the  real 
joy  of  striving  for  a  Heaven  on  Earth  consists  in  the  striving 
itself,  and  not  in  the  hope  of  realization. 

It  is  but  shifting  the  question  to  say  that  it  is  natural  for 
man  to  strive  for  the  beautiful.  Why  is  it  natural  to  strive 
for  beauty?  Why  do  we  love  life?  Why  do  we  love  music? 
Because  life,  the  Soul  of  Things,  is  harmony.  There  is  a 
note  vibrating  through  the  universe  which  causes  all  things 
to  vibrate  in  unison  with  it.  It  makes  inanimate  Nature  take 
form  in  harmonious  lines  of  beauty.  Not  even  a  snowflake  but 
joyfully  obeys  this  rhythmic  law  of  beauty.  In  response  to 
it  the  butterfly  paints  her  wings  and  the  nightingale  tunes 
her  lute.  The  composer  arranges  his  anthem,  the  painter  his 
colors,  the  poet  his  words,  and  the  true  man  his  deeds,  to 
come  into  unison  with  the  same  great  song  of  life.  The  effort 
is  with  most  of  us  unconscious  to-day.  When  we  shall  become 
conscious  of  what  we  are  doing,  we  shall  experience  the  greater 
joy  that  a  Mozart  possesses  over  a  nightingale,  a  Raphael  over 
a  butterfly.  The  joy  of  the  consciousness  of  harmony  is 
greater  than  the  mere  sensation  of  the  harmony:  It  is  the 
joy  of  the  soul  over  the  body.  Anyone  can  enjoy  a  symphony, 
but  the  greatest  joy  comes  to  those  who  understand,  to  mu- 
sicians. There  is  the  joy  of  the  material  and  the  joy  of  the 
spiritual;  but  the  joy  of  the  spiritual  must  have  a  material 
base.  To  have  spiritual  harmony  we  must  have  material 
harmony.  I  may  enjoy  the  symphony  more  in  my  soul  than  in 
my  ears,  but  I  must  have  ears  to  support  the  soul's  delight. 
I  may  hear  the  symphony  but  once,  but  I  must  have  had  ears 
to  have  heard  it  that  once  if  it  is  to  light  my  soul  through 
eternity.  The  spirit  must  have  the  earth  to  root  itself  in; 
otherwise  there  can  be  no  spirit.  We  cannot  have  souls  with- 
out bodies,  and  we  cannot  have  great  souls  if  we  starve  the 
body. 

Life  is  the  successive  annihilation  of  shorter  rhythmic  waves 
by  larger  ones,  a  continuous  progression  to  an  infinitely  great 
vibration.  You  have  seen  a  storm  begin  at  sea — first  come 
the  ripples,  then  the  short,  choppy  waves,  and  finally  the 


88  Socialism  Inevitable 

grand,  heaving  swells  which  absorb  all  the  little  waves  and 
ripples  that  preceded  them.  Humanity  is  still  in  the  ripple 
stage,  but  the  storm  is  rising,  and  all  men  are  being  irresist- 
ibly forced  from  their  petty  vibrations,  with  the  little  ripples, 
into  the  larger  waves  of  human  thought  and  sympathy  now  so 
rapidly  forming  on  the  ocean  of  life. 


How  High  Can  Wages  Go?  89 


HOW  HIGH  CAN  WAGES  GO? 

(December,  1902.) 

A  GREAT  many  employers  conscientiously  believe  that 
wages  cannot  be  raised  if  the  increase  will  make  the 
cost  of  production  greater  than  the  present  receipts  pf 
the  business  will  allow.  They  seem  quite  oblivious  to  the  pos- 
sibility of  raising  prices  sufficiently  to  enable  them  to  pay  the 
higher  wages. 

In  the  last  coal  strike  the  operators  said  that  if  they  paid 
the  wages  demanded  by  the  miners  they  could  not  get  enough 
for  the  coal  to  enable  them  to  meet  the  cost  of  production. 
However,  as  soon  as  production  was  curtailed  the  price  of 
coal  went  up  from  $6  to  $20  a  ton.  Here,  then,  was  a  differ- 
ence of  $14-  a  ton,  while  the  advance  in  cost  of  mining,  which 
would  have  resulted  from  paying  the  increase  of  wages  de- 
manded by  the  miners,  would  not  have  amounted  to  twenty 
cents  a  ton. 

The  people  simply  must  have  coal,  and  if  the  cost  of 
operating  the  mines  forces  up  the  price,  then,  rather  than  go 
without,  they  will  pay  whatever  is  necessary  to  get  it.  Of 
course,  when  such  a  tremendous  rise  takes  place  there  is 
naturally  a  great  diminution  of  demand,  but  this  does  not 
alter  the  fact  that  the  operators  will  be  able  to  make  enough 
on  the  coal  that  is  sold  to  pay  the  miners  tremendous  wages. 
I  take  the  following  from  the  Toronto  World: 

EMPLOYER  AND  EMPLOYEE. 

But  no  power  on  earth  can  make  an  industry  or  a  business 
carry  a  heavier  wage  burden  than  its  strength  will  uphold.  Over- 
loaded, it  must  get  rid  of  part  of  the  burden  or  it  must  sink.  And  the 
alternative  which  the  wage  earner  must  choose  is  to  lighten  the 
burden  when  it  is  too  heavy,  and  not  to  increase  it  when  it  is  as 
heavy  as  can  be  tolerated,  or  he  will  do  the  worst  thing  he  can 
do  for  himself.  He  will  narrow  his  own  field  of  employment. 
He  will  diminish  its  fruits  which  may  be  divided  with  him.  He 
will  kill  the  goose  that  lays  the  golden  egg. — New  York  Press. 


90  Socialism  Inevitable 

"This  editorial  opinion/'  says  the  Toronto  World,  "is  called 
forth  by  the  current  trend  of  the  labor  situation  in  Great 
Britain  and  the  United  States.  According  to  the  London, 
Eng.,  Chamber  of  Commerce  returns,  there  occurred  in  1901 
for  the  first  time  since  1895  a  heavy  fall  in  the  total  wages 
of  British  workmen.  In  1901,  the  Chamber  of  Commerce 
Journal  computes,  there  was  a  decrease  in  wages  of  £1,584,000 
(about  $7,900,000),  as  against  an  increase  in  1900  of  about 
£6,000,000.  Thus  far  in  1902  the  downward  tendency  has 
continued,  so  that  the  end  of  the  year  will  doubtless  show  a 
further  recession  of  the  total  wages  from  the  highest  figures 
of  1901. 

"It  is  found,  on  looking  further  into  the  Chamber  of  Com- 
merce report,  that  though  this  reduction  occurred  in  the 
total  wages  paid  out,  in  some  groups  of  industries  the  work- 
men actually  secured  increased  wages.  In  other  words,  while 
wages  in  particular  groups  have  advanced,  the  general  decline 
in  wages  forced  the  total  results  far  down,  as  the  statistics 
quoted  above  show. 

"Taking  these  figures  as  a  text,  The  Press  warns  trades 
unions  against  the  indiscriminate  forcing  up  of  wages  in 
industries,  some  of  which  may  not  be  able  to  stand  the  ad- 
advance  in  expenditure  entailed.    The  Press  then  proceeds : 

Because  there  has  been  a  great  boom  in  one  industry,  with 
largely  increased  wages,  not  only  made  possible  but  voluntarily 
raised  in  response  to  the  universal  law  of  supply  and  demand, 
we  have  seen  undiscriminating  wage-earners  taking  it  for  granted 
that  there  should  be  a  corresponding  increase  in  wages  in  indus- 
tries and  occupations  which  have  been  in  fact,  for  one  reason  or 
another,  languishing.  They  have  attempted  to  enforce  their 
demands  when  the  temporary  enforcement  of  them  must  inevit- 
ably cripple  their  employers,  if  not  drive  some  of  them  to  the 
wall.  A  case  in  point  whose  details  we  have  given  some  study  is 
that  of  the  carting  and  trucking  business.  For  the  last  two  years 
this  business  has  been  staggering  under  burdens  of  exceptional 
disadvantage.  The  increased  cost  of  horses  put  a  heavy  tax  on 
it.  The  increased  cost  of  all  the  materials  used  for  building  and 
repairing  the  equipment  of  the  business — the  wood,  the  iron  and 
steel  of  the  wagons  and  the  material  of  the  harness — added  to 
the  burden.  Then  the  cost  of  feed,  owing  to  the  crop  failures, 
practically  doubled,  so  that  the  trucking  and  general  delivery 
business  was  in  the  worst  shape  to  make  money  at  any  time  in 
years.  And  at  that  very  time  of  distress — at  the  extreme  depres- 
sion of  the  business — the  drivers,  handlers  and  other  workmen 


How  High  Can  Wages  Go?  91 

employed  in  the  group  decided  that  because  others  had  been  get- 
ting advances  in  wages— they  should  get  them.  The  demands 
were  presented  by  the  union  and  the  choice  was  given  to  the 
employers  of  granting  them  or  of  suffering  a  strike.  In  one  case 
which  we  examined  the  new  scale  presented  to  an  employer 
called  for  an  additional  wage  payment  of  $60,000  a  year.  The 
business  was  not  making  one-fourth  of  that  sum.  But  the  scale 
was  generally  enforced,  with  the  result  that  some  of  thj  employ- 
ers were  compelled  to  cut  down  the  number  of  their  wagons,  to 
injure  the  efficiency  of  their  service,  and  to  reduce  the  scope  of 
their  business,  while  others  were  put  out  of  business  entirely. 

In  these  days  of  searching  for  a  means  of  bringing  capital 
and  labor  into  proper  relations  with  each  other,  any  illumi- 
nating comment  on  the  problem  is  of  interest,  and  we  there- 
fore quote  our  contemporary  on  this  question. 

The  average  production  per  laborer  according  to  Census 
Bulletin  150,  U.  S.  Reports,  is  $2,451  a  year  while  the  wages 
paid  average  $437.  Certainly,  if  the  laborers  were  completely 
organized  they  could  get  the  whole  of  the  $2,451  that  they 
produce,  less  such  sum  as  the  capitalist  might  need  to  keep 
up  his  plant  and  his  wages  for  superintendence. 

The  Steel  Trust  to-day  pays  profits  of  more  than  one 
hundred  millions  a  year,  but  if  the  times  were  dull  they  would 
run  the  works  at  a  loss  rather  than  shut  down.  If  labor 
could  hold  its  own  in  a  strike,  it  could  put  up  wages  to  the 
extent  of  absorbing  the  whole  of  the  present  one  hundred 
millions  profit,  for  it  would  pay  Mr.  Morgan  to  lose  all  his 
profits  rather  than  close  the  works. 

In  the  case  of  the  trucking  industry  in  New  York  which 
The  Press  refers  to,  it  can  be  seen  upon  a  moment's  reflection 
that  the  carriage  of  freight  from  the  depot  to  the  store  is  an 
absolute  necessity  to  the  merchant.  There  is  no  substitute 
that  can  be  offered  for  transportation  by  trucks.  He  simply 
must  pay  what  the  teamsters  demand  or  go  out  of  business. 
He  has  been  basing  his  business  upon  a  certain  cost  of  truck- 
age, but  he  must  re-base  it  upon  another  cost  and  add  the 
difference  to  the  selling  price  of  his  goods.  Nor  need  he  fear 
his  competitors,  for  the  same  extra  cost  will  force  them  to 
adopt  the  same  means  of  preservation.  If  the  extra  cost  of 
trucking  would  ruin  business  in  New  York,  then  the  excessive 
rents  paid  there  to  the  land  owners  should  certainly  have 
ruined  business  long  ago.     But  we  all  know  that  business 


92  Socialism  Inevitable 

increases  every  year  in  New  York,  and  every  year  up  go  rents. 
The  merchants  simply  recoup  themselves  by  charging  higher 
prices.  If,  on  the  other  hand,  people  could  not  afford  to 
pay  the  prices,  they  would  move  away  and  down  would  tumble 
rents. 


The  American  Ideal  93 


THE  AMERICAN  IDEAL 

(February,  1903.) 

ONE  often  hears  the  cynical  remark  that  we  Americans 
have  lost  our  ideals.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  it  is  abso- 
lutely impossible  for  a  man  to  lose  his  ideals,  although 
conditions  may  be  such  that,  unless  he  sees,  or  thinks  he  sees, 
the  possibility  of  realizing  them,  he  endeavors  to  banish  them 
from  his  mind.  We  Americans  are  to-day  largely  of  the 
opinion  that  our  old  ideal  of  freedom  for  the  citizen  seems  to 
have  become  an  impossibility.  There  was  a  time  when  we 
thought  that  individual  energy  and  talent  were  all  that  was 
necessary  to  insure  one's  independence  and  success,  in  life. 

On  the  other  hand,  we  always  realized  that  economic  in- 
dependence presupposed  the  possession  of  wealth;  and  now, 
inasmuch  as  a  great  part  of  the  wealth  of  this  country  has 
passed  into  the  hands  of  the  trusts,  its  individual  acquisition 
has  become  wellnigh  impossible  to  the  great  mass  of  the 
people.  We  have  furthermore  given  up  hope  of  any  distribu- 
tion on  the  part  of  the  trusts  through  the  enforcement  of 
anti-Trust  laws;  and  but  few  of  us  yet  see  that  this  distribu- 
tion can  be  effected  by  State  Ownership. 

Judge  Grosscup,  who  recently  made  a  very  learned  speech 
upon  the  subject  of  the  Trust,  says  that  the  first  step  toward 
their  regulation  should  be  the  repeal  of  the  Sherman  Anti- 
Trust  Law.  Of  course  he  is  right ;  but  since  he  does  not  pro- 
pose any  other  law  to  take  its  place,  it  is  really  a  confession 
of  a  most  pessimistic  attitude  on  the  part  of  a  man  who  should 
be  thoroughly  competent  to  judge  of  the  situation.  Hit. 
logic,  however,  is  keener  and  clearer  than  that  of  President 
Roosevelt,  who  proposes  all  sorts  of  remedies,  each  more 
manifestly  impossible  than  its  predecessor.  Judge  Grosscup, 
in  short,  realizes  the  futility  of  things  as  they  are ;  and  I  take 
it  that  the  great  mass  of  the  American  people  are  in  agreement 
with  him  on  this  point,  having  lost  confidence  in  Roosevelt 


94  Socialism  Inevitable 

and  his  political  confreres  who  talk  about  proceeding  against 
the  trusts  on  the  old  lines. 

But  while  we  have  largely  resigned  ourselves  to  Grosscup's 
position  that  nothing  can  be  done,  as  things  are  at  present, 
we  do  feel  that  the  future  has  something  else  in  store.  This 
feeling,  indeed,  is  inborn.  We  cannot  get  rid  of  the  idea  that 
America  means  something  more  than  a  mere  pleasure  ground 
for  a  few  Goulds  and  Vanderbilts  and  their  retainers.  Dimly, 
unconsciously  perhaps,  we  believe  in  a  glorious  destiny  for 
the  nation. 

I  appeal,  therefore,  to  the  young  men  of  America  to  come 
forward  and  help  toward  the  realization  of  the  American  ideal 
of  freedom.  It  is  really  you  who  should  bear  the  brunt  of 
assisting  in  making  the  change  from  the  present  autocratic 
industrial  condition  to  a  democratic  one.  You  realize  that 
the  country  is  rich  enough  to  make  the  very  suggestion  of  the 
necessity  of  poverty  a  ghastly  mockery.  If  your  grand- 
fathers could  look  to  a  future  of  happiness  and  freedom  and 
wealth,  when  they  had  no  dream  of  the  labor-saving  machinery 
of  to-day,  then  certainly  it  is  not  flattering  to  your  intelligence 
if  you  think  that  poverty  is  necessary  when  we  have  at  hand 
such  abundant  means  to  prevent  it. 

But  what  is  the  young  man  doing  to-day  to  realize  the 
ideal  which  must  be  within  his  breast?  Practically  nothing. 
Instead  of  paying  attention  to  political  and  industrial  de- 
velopments, he  is  more  apt  to  be  speculating  on  the  result  of 
a  football  game  or  a  horse  race.  Instead  of  having  pity  for 
the  poor  of  the  country  who  are  suffering  from  unnecessary 
poverty,  he  is  wasting  his  life  in  pool  and  billiard  rooms, 
smoking  cigarettes.  He  goes  to  school  and  college,  it  is  true, 
but  his  main  idea  is  not  to  acquire  culture  or  learning,  but 
to  get  sufficient  credit  marks  to  graduate  him  with  the  least 
possible  work,  that  he  may  have  the  greatest  possible  amount 
of  time  to  devote  to  dissipation. 

This  is  certainly  no  flattering  picture,  and  may  have  a  very 
depressing  effect  upon  those  people  who,  as  they  view  the 
country,  see  little  indication  of  a  change  in  the  sentiment  and 
conduct  of  our  young  men.  Nevertheless,  I  can  see  that  this 
mode  of  life,  while  most  deplorable,  has  not  succeeded  in 
utterly  destroying  his  ideals.  The  trouble  is  simply  that  the 
conditions  which  may  look  to  their  realization  seem  so  im- 


The  American  Ideal  95 

possible  to  him  that  he  is  now  dissipating  energies  which 
would,  under  other  conditions,  be  turned  into  better  and  nobler 
channels.  It  is  not  that  the  young  American  does  not  wish 
to  control  his  own  country  and  his  own  destiny,  but  that  he 
does  not  see  how  to  do  it. 

It  is  the  mission  of  the  Socialist  not  only  to  inspire  these 
young  men  with  the  ideal  of  commanding  their  own  destiny, 
but  also  to  show  them  how  this  command  can  be  attained. 
The  "reform"  school  of  politics,  some  twenty-five  years  ago, 
attempted  to  appeal  to  our  young  men  by  holding  up  to  them 
the  ideal  of  honesty  in  office.  This  movement  has  failed  of 
its  purpose,  and  in  consequence  a  great  many  of  the  men  of 
the  Carl  Schurz  type,  and  those  whose  views  are  represented 
by  the  editorials  of  the  New  York  "Evening  Post,"  are  be- 
coming exceedingly  pessimistic.    After  all,  this  is  but  natural. 

The  average  young  man  of  to-day  has  no  property.  He 
knows  that  if  he  goes  into  politics  he  will  lose  caste  with  his 
business  associates,  the  general  theory  throughout  the  country 
being — and  it  is  a  well-founded  one — that  "politics  ruin  a 
man."  This,  of  course,  refers  to  the  old  parties;  for  no  one 
thinks  of  connecting  himself  with  one  of  them  except  with 
the  idea  of  getting  an  office  or  bettering  his  individual  con- 
dition. Going  into  "reform"  politics  on  the  other  hand,  has 
no  attractions,  because  it  only  means  the  election  to  office  of 
certain  men  who  pretend  to  be  more  honest  than  "the  old 
party"  men,  whereas,  if  elected,  experience  goes  to  show  that 
they  do  not  make  good.  And  moreover,  even  if  they  did,  the  ben- 
efit accruing  from  an  honest  administration  falls  largely  to  the 
few  who  own  property,  rather  than  to  the  great  mass  of  the 
people. 

Thus  it  is  easy  enough  to  see  why  neither  "old  party" 
politics  nor  "reform"  politics  attracts  the  young  man.  Social- 
ist politics  would  attract  him  if  he  were  to  give  it  sufficient 
thought  to  know  what  Socialism  means,  but  he  doesn't.  He 
regards  the  Socialist  as  a  crank  with  some  wild  visions  of  an 
impossible  Utopia  that  is  to  be  reached  some  time  after  the 
next  thousand  years.  He  does  not  understand  that  the  Trust 
is  the  greatest  argument  the  Socialist  uses  to  prove  the  in- 
evitability of  Socialism ;  and  the  chances  are  that  he  will  not 
realize  the  force  of  this  argument  until  the  Trust  itself  finally 
throws  him  out  of  his  job. 


96  Socialism  Inevitable 

All  mankind  has  an  ideal  of  a  paradise  on  earth;  and  if 
we  analyze  our  idea  of  that  paradise  it  resolves  itself  into  a 
condition  of  existence  where  everyone  is  on  an  economic  equal- 
ity, where  there  is  no  danger  of  starvation,  where  there  is  not 
too  much  work,  and  where  everybody  is  happy.  Now,  in  order 
to  banish  fear  of  starvation  it  is  necessary  to  have  the  earth 
on  which  to  raise  the  food,  and  to  raise  the  food  with  ease  it 
is  necessary  to  have  machinery.  We  Americans  certainly  have 
provided  the  earth  with  machinery  in  a  larger  degree  than 
has  ever  been  done  before.  We  know  how  to  produce  the 
greatest  quantity  of  wealth  with  the  least  amount  of  human 
labor  that  has  ever  been  required  in  the  world's  history.  We 
have  made  the  first  great  step  toward  our  earthly  paradise. 
The  only  thing  that  remains  for  us  to  do  is  to  devise  a  plan 
by  which  we  can  distribute  the  wealth  which  we  so  easily  pro- 
duce. When  we  achieve  that  end,  we  shall  realize  the  American 
Ideal. 

Our  work  is  to  make  the  young  American  see  that  his  ideal 
can  be  reached  only  through  the  advent  of  Socialism. 


Classes  In  America  97 


CLASSES  IN  AMERICA 

(March,  1903.) 

WE  Americans  have  a  great  advantage  over  other  nations 
in  our  unconsciousness  of  classes.  That  we  have 
rich  and  poor  is  not  to  be  gainsaid;  but  that  we 
have  classes  and  class  feeling,  is  almost  as  vigorously  denied 
by  the  poor  as  by  the  rich.  And  this  denial  of  the  obvious 
has  an  effect  upon  the  social  consciousness  that  it  is  hard  to 
over-estimate. 

In  Europe  classes  are  a  recognized  institution.  The  peasant 
never  thinks  that  he  is  anything  but  a  peasant,  nor  does  the 
nobleman  ever  think  he  is  anything  but  a  nobleman. 
Even  the  very  rich  capitalist  feels  that  he  is  hardly  as  good 
as  the  poor  aristocrat. 

In  America,  while  differences  in  wealth  have  really  made 
very  distinct  class  lines,  we  refuse  to  recognize  this  con- 
dition; and  there  is  no  doubt  that  this  refusal  will  sooner 
or  later  have  a  considerable  political  effect.  We  deny,  in 
fact,  that  Mr.  Eockefeller's  money  was  ever  given  to  him 
except  for  the  benefit  of  the  whole  people,  and  insist  that 
the  wealth  of  such  men  will  be  distributed  in  due  course  of 
time  by  natural  laws,  and  that  the  sons  of  other  men  will 
be  quite  as  likely  to  own  Eockef eller's  wealth  as  his  own 
descendants.  This,  indeed,  is  the  stock  argument  of  almost 
all  opponents  of  Socialism.  They  insist  that  while  there  is 
great  wealth  in  a  few  hands,  this  is  simply  an  ephemeral 
condition  of  affairs,  and  that  no  one  family  will  hold  the 
bulk  of  its  wealth  any  length  of  time. 

Now  so  long  as  people  generally  believe  this,  it  is  not 
difficult  to  understand  why  they  refuse  to  consider  any  change 
of  society  which  would  aim  at  preventing  the  concentration  of 
wealth,  feeling,  as  they  do,  that  things  will  regulate  them- 
selves automatically.  But  we  are  now  beginning  to  realize 
that  this  concentration  of  wealth,  and  the  holding  of  the 
natural  resources  of  the  country  by  a  few  immensely  rich 


98  Socialism  Inevitable 

families,  instead  of  an  ephemeral  state  of  affairs,  has  every 
indication  of  being  a  permanency.  Every  year  the  very  rich 
are  becoming  more  and  more  strongly  intrenched  behind  their 
ramparts  of  gold,  and  the  public  are  generally  recognizing  that 
under  our  existing  social  system  there  is  no  possible  remedy 
for  the  inequality  of  wealth. 

It  is  true  there  have  been  anti-Trust  bills  galore  introduced 
in  Congress,  having  for  their  object  the  levelling  of  the  great 
fortunes ;  but  these  bills  are  felt  by  everyone  to  be  of  no  pos- 
sible avail  in  that  direction.  Concentration  of  wealth  is  an 
inevitable  result  of  our  economic  system,  and  we  can  no  more 
make  effective  laws  to  prevent  it  than  we  can  make  laws  to 
prevent  the  sun  shining. 

However,  the  introduction  of  these  anti-Trust  bills,  year 
after  year,  in  Congress,  indicates  strongly  the  wish  of  the 
people  to  level  wealth  and  to  abolish  conditions  which  make 
classes.  They  are  also  a  very  reluctant  confession  that  there 
is  such  a  thing  as  a  class  cleavage  in  the  United  States.  Our 
sentiments,  in  short,  are  too  strongly  democratic  to  allow  any 
classes  to  remain  if  we  can  possibly  prevent  it,  and  to  this 
extent  Socialism,  which  aims  to  abolish  classes,  will  have  a 
spiritual  significance  to  the  people  of  America  which  it  has 
not  in  European  countries  where  aristocracy  is  a  recognized 
institution. 

Now  there  has  never  been  a  nation  of  free  people,  such  as 
we  Americans  are,  who  have  resolved  year  after  year  that 
they  wished  to  do  a  certain  thing,  and  with  every  reason  to 
gain  that  wish,  and  also  every  means  for  carding  it  into 
effect,  have  not  finally  succeeded  in  their  desires.  While  we 
scoff  at  the  anti-Trust  laws,  we  can  nevertheless  see  behind 
them  the  determination  of  the  people  to  accomplish  the  es- 
tablishment of  an  economic  equality  in  this  country.  It  was 
the  same  before  our  separation  from  England  when  there 
was  a  long  period  in  which  we  kept  on  passing  resolutions 
against  her  oppression,  and  even  having  physical  encounters 
with  her.  Yet  it  was  with  the  greatest  reluctance  we  ever 
finally  considered  the  possibility  of  separation  from  the  mother 
country ;  in  fact,  it  was  once  considered  rank  treason  to  refer 
to  independence  as  an  ultimate  outcome  of  the  agitation 
against  England's  tyranny.  We  expected  to  make  some  sort 
of  a  compromise  by  which  we  would  still  remain  colonies,  and 


Classes  In  America  99 

yet  participate  in  all  the  advantages  of  an  independent  nation. 

It  is  the  same  to-day :  we  allow  the  Kockefellers  and  Morgans 
to  own  ns,  and  yet  we  expect  to  have  all  the  luxuries  of  com- 
plete independence  which  can  only  accompany  self-ownership. 
Of  course  it  will  finally  be  found  to  be  just  as  impossible  for 
us  to  remain  free  and  independent  under  King  Morgan  as  it 
was  more  than  a  century  ago  under  King  George.  Theoretic- 
ally, in  fact,  as  has  been  proved  by  the  English  colonies — 
Canada  and  Australia,  New  Zealand,  etc. — the  latter  would 
have  been  much  more  feasible,  for  King  George  did  not  need 
to  have  been  a  benevolent  despot  to  have  kept  the  American 
colonies ;  he  needed  but  to  have  been  sane.  King  Morgan,  with 
all  his  benevolence,  can  never  keep  his  American  colonies, 
simply  because  the  economic  system  will  prevent  him  from 
devising  a  plan  which  can  avert  a  great  unemployed  problem. 
Under  King  George  the  economic  problem  was  how  we  could 
produce  enough  to  give  us  the  comforts  and  luxuries  of  life. 
Under  King  Morgan  the  problem  is,  how  can  we  prevent  our- 
selves producing  too  much?  Our  fear  is  that  we  will  be 
swamped  in  a  rising  tide  of  wealth. 

What  we  must  do  then  is  not  to  try  and  prevent  the  sea 
of  wealth  from  rising,  but  to  construct  the  bark  of  Socialism 
which  will  float  us  safely  upon  it,  so  that  instead  of  being 
menaced  by  the  rising  tide  we  will  be  borne  forward  upon  it 
to  the  Golden  Age  of  Man. 


100  Socialism  Inevitable 


THE  MYSTERIOUS  MR.  HEARST 

(April,    1903.) 

MK.  HEAEST  is  more  or  less  a  mystery  to  certain 
advanced  thinkers.  They  see  him  publishing  a 
great  paper  of  enormous  circulation,  having  a 
policy  which  is,  on  the  whole,  very  Socialistic,  and  whose 
editorials  are  the  strongest  to  be  found  in  any  American 
daily.  And  yet  they  are  always  prepared  for  the  most 
glaring  inconsistency  on  his  part  at  any  moment.  For 
instance,  one  day  they  find  him  showing  how  absolutely 
impossible  it  is  to  do  anything  in  the  way  of  destroying 
the  Trust,  since  it  represents  the  natural  evolution  of  in- 
dustry, yet  the  very  next  day  he  comes  out  with  an  editorial 
calling  for  the  destruction  of  so-called  criminal  trusts,  where- 
as by  his  own  analysis  he  has  proved  that  the  Trust  cannot  be 
criminal,  because  it  is  simply  a  result  of  natural  law. 

Again,  he  will  show  the  impossibility  of  obtaining  justice 
under  the  existing  competitive  system,  where  the  machinery 
of  production  is  owned  by  a  few  great  monopolists,  and  then 
he  follows  with  an  editorial  to  the  effect  that  all  one  has  to  do  to 
get  along,  is  to  attend  strictly  to  the  employment  in  which  God 
has  seen  fit  to  place  him  in  this  world.  Later  on,  he  will 
have  an  editorial  showing  that  all  poverty  is  traceable  not  to 
the  monopoly  of  the  earth  by  the  Vanderbilts  and  the  Rocke- 
fellers, but  to  the  drinking  of  whiskey  by  the  workingmen; 
whereupon,  to  cap  the  climax,  as  if  more  were  needed  to  con- 
fuse the  people  as  to  his  sincerity,  he  keeps  insisting  in  a 
delicate  manner,  by  quoting  from  other  papers,  upon  the  great 
desirability  of  electing  Mr.  Hearst  President  of  the  United 
States. 

It  seems  to  me  that  from  his  own  standpoint,  or  what- 
ever way  we  may  look  at  it,  this  last  stroke  is  the  worst 
possible  policy. 

I  can  conceive  how,  in  order  to  keep  all  classes  of  readers 
and  hold  his  advertisers,  he  must  give  all  sorts  of  views  as  to 


The  Mysterious  IdR.  Keaiist  101 

what  should  be  done,  and  advocate  temperance,  the  destruc- 
tion of  trusts,  national  ownership  of  trusts,  tariff  reform,  and 
everything  else  which  will  bring  fish  into  his  net;  but  when 
he  utilizes  his  paper  to  boom  himself  for  the  Presidency,  he 
immediately  makes  a  large  number  of  people  feel  that,  after 
all,  he  does  not  mean  anything  he  says,  but  simply  has  his 
say  in  order  to  place  himself  in  the  Presidential  chair. 

My  own  theory  regarding  Mr.  Hearst  is  a  very  simple  one. 
He  is  following  an  irresistible  law  of  his  nature  to  bring 
about  harmony  in  the  universe ;  but  he  is  ignorant  as  to  how 
to  do  it.  He  is  also  following  an  irresistible  law  which  forces 
him  to  take  care  of  his  own  individuality ;  and  the  result  of 
his  ignorance  of  economic  laws  on  the  one  hand,  together 
with  his  extreme  egotism  on  the  other,  is  that  many  people 
entirely  misunderstand  him. 


102  Socialism  Inevitable 


A  TALK  WITH  ROCKEFELLER 

(May,  1903.) 

LAST  March,  while  on  my  way  from  Los  Angeles  to 
San  Francisco,  I  had  occasion  to  stop  over  for  a  few 
days  at  Santa  Barbara,  one  of  the  most  famous  of 
the  California  resorts.  Except  for  the  want  of  angels,  Santa 
Barbara  is  about  as  near  to  being  an  earthly  Paradise  as  one 
can  imagine.  It  lies  directly  on  the  Pacific  Ocean  at  the 
opening  of  a  beautiful  little  valley,  at  the  head  of  which, 
under  the  mountains,  is  the  old  Franciscan  monastery,  built 
by  the  monks  a  hundred  and  fifty  years  or  more  ago,  when 
California  was  under  the  dominion  of  Spaim 

The  Church  of  Kome  at  that  time  had  a  grand  plan  in 
hand  to  convert  the  Indians  to  Catholicism  by  the  establish- 
ment of  a  chain  of  semi-Socialistic  communities  extending 
from  San  Francisco  all  the  way  down  to  the  lower  end  of 
the  Peninsula  of  California.  With  the  ceding  of  California 
to  the  United  States,  however,  the  monasteries  had  a  hard 
time  to  survive,  for  the  property  they  had  owned  was  largely 
lost,  and  the  Indians.,  who  had  been  faithful  workers  in  their 
fields  and  vineyards,  were  dispersed.  Probably  at  no  time 
before,  and  certainly  at  no  time  since,  have  the  California 
Indians  had  either  the  material  or  the  spiritual  advantages 
that  they  enjoyed  under  the  kindly  rule  of  the  old  Mission 
padres. 

At  that  time  the  missions  were  surrounded  by  great 
stretches  of  pasture  land,  upon  which  grazed  numerous  herds 
of  sheep,  cattle  and  horses,  all  the  property  of  the  padres, 
but  used  for  the  benefit  of  the  whole  community.  The  monks 
furthermore  introduced  a  good  system  of  irrigation,  and  the 
fig,  the  vine,  the  olive  and  the  orange  were  cultivated  with 
great  success.  Then  the  greater  the  production,  the  more 
the  monks  and  Indians  received.  There  was  no  fear  of 
starvation  on  account  of  "over-production"  in  those  silly, 
primitive  days.    They  produced  for  use  and  not  for  profit. 


A  Talk  With  Rockefeller  103 

I  can  imagine  how  astounded  one  of  the  old  padres  would 
have  been  if  told  that  he  would  be  forced  to  go  without 
olive  oil  some  day  if  too  many  olive  trees  came  into  bear- 
ing, because  the  price  of  olive  oil  would  fall  below  the  cost 
of  production.  Such  reasoning  would  have  been  absolutely 
incomprehensible  to  him,  and  had  I  been  there  to  inform 
him  that  the  Mission  must  go  hungry  simply  because  there 
were  too  many  fat  cattle,  I  would,  no  doubt,  have  been 
regarded  as  a  fit  subject  for  the  "rest  cure." 

In  those  careless  times,  however,  they  had  no  "rest  cures/' 
for,  paradoxically,  everyone  had  to  do  enough  work  not  to 
require  a  rest.  The  people  who  most  need  relaxation  are 
those  that  do  not  have  to  work.  I  don't  say  they  do  not 
actually  work  hard,  but  simply  that  they  do  not  "have  to" 
work  at  all.  There  is  a  fine  distinction:  Mr.  Schwab  never 
broke  down  until  he  worked  because  he  "wanted  to."  But 
we  are  in  the  days  when  people  do  need  a  "rest  cure,"  and 
Mr.  John  D.  Rockefeller,  being  no  exception  to  the  rule, 
showed  his  usual  good  judgment  in  selecting  Santa  Barbara. 

The  Hotel  Potter  directly  faces  the  sea.  It  is  a  fine, 
modern  hostelry  opened  this  season  for  the  first  time,  and 
Mr.  Rockefeller  was  by  no  means  the  only  multi-millionaire 
enjoying  its  perfect  climate.  Indeed  the  local  Santa  Bar- 
bara paper  proudly  printed  a  list  of  our  American  nobility 
there,  gauging  the  relative  value  of  titles  by  the  size  of  the 
bank  rolls.  The  total  footed  up  to  something  near  a  thou- 
sand million  dollars,  which  can  be  readily  believed  when  I 
say  that  the  guests  included  Mrs.  Pierpont  Morgan,  Mr. 
Marshall  Field,  Mr.  Armour^  Mr.  Seward  Webb,  and  other 
scarcely  less  notable  multi-millionaires.  Robert  T.  Lincoln, 
the  son  of  President  Lincoln,  was  also  there,  scheduled  at 
ten  million,  but  of  all  the  lot,  Mr.  Rockefeller,  being  the 
richest,  was  the  noblest,  and,  naturally,  the  centre  of  attrac- 
tion to  all  Santa  Barbara,  and  especially  myself. 

Mr.  Rockefeller  is  by  no  means  the  physical  wreck  that 
the  press  likes  to  picture  him.  I  sat  at  the  next  table  to 
him  and  can  vouch  for  the  strength  and  scope  of  his  appe- 
tite. His  color  is  good,  and  he  looks  a  fairly  healthy  man 
for  his  age,  sixty-four,  with  the  exception  that  he  has  lost 
every  spear  of  hair  from  his  head  and  face.  He  was  most 
affable  and  approachable,  and  seemed  to  make  a  point  of 


104  Socialism  Inevitable 

going  the  rounds  every  day  with  a  glad  hand  extended  to 
all.  His  interest  in  life,  however,  seemed  to  be  centered 
on  the  game  of  golf. 

Knowing  that  his  nervous  system  is  so  impaired  that  he 
does  not  wish  to  burden  his  mind  with  anything  very  strenu- 
ous, I  really  felt  conscience-stricken  in  ever  departing  from 
the  subject  of  the  weather  and  golf  in  my  talks  with  him. 
However,  one  day  I  did  bring  up  the  subject  of  the  Trust. 
He  listened  with  interest  to  my  exposition  of  the  Socialist 
philosophy  regarding  monopoly,  and  said,  "Well,  Mr.  Wil- 
shire,  I  can't  speak  as  to  other  trusts,  but  certainly,  so  far 
as  the  Standard  is  concerned,  the  over-production  of  oil  led 
to  its  formation.  We  were  producing  three  times  as  much 
oil  as  could  be  sold  and  the  trade  was  in  a  very  bad  way. 
The  Trust  resulted  in  the  greatest  benefit  to  the  refiners,  while 
the  general  public  were  also  benefitted  by  getting  lower 
prices." 

Mr.  Eockefeller  then  inquired  if  I  had  read  the  articles 
by  Miss  Tarbell  upon  the  Standard  Oil  Trust  now  running 
in  McClure's  Magazine.  "All  without  foundation,"  he  said ; 
"the  idea  of  the  Standard  forcing  anyone  to  sell  his  refinery 
to  it  is  absurd.  The  refiners  wanted  to  sell  out  to  us,  and 
there  is  nobody  who  sold  out  and  worked  with  us  but  has 
made  money  and  is  glad  he  did  so. 

"Now,  you,  Mr.  Wilshire,  are  personally  acquainted  with 
so  and  so  (mentioning  men,  our  mutual  friends,  interested 
in  Standard  Oil),  and  you  know  that  such  honorable  men 
would  not  do  anything  maliciously  to  injure  anyone.  You 
know,  furthermore,  that  they  all  did  well  by  coming  into 
the  Trust.  I  can  tell  you  that  everyone  who  came  in  with  us 
has  done  well.  It's  absurd  to  say  that  the  Standard  forced  the 
refiners  into  the  Trust.  They  were  only  too  glad  to  come 
in,  and  they  have  all  made  money.  Natural  conditions  would 
have  ruined  us  all  if  we  had  not  formed  a  combination. 

"I  thought  once  of  having  an  answer  made  to  the  McClure 
articles,"  continued  Mr.  Eockefeller,  "but  you  know  it  has 
always  been  the  policy  of  the  Standard  to  keep  silent  under 
attack  and  let  our  acts  speak  for  us.  I  suppose  it  is  the 
best  policy  for  us  to  continue  upon  that  line,  don't  you,  Mr. 
Wilshire?" 

I  was  quite  overcome  with  confusion  at  having  the  richest 


A  Talk  With  Eockefeller  105 

man  in  the  world  seek  the  advice  of  a  Socialist  upon  a  ques- 
tion of  personal  conduct. 

"Don't  you  think,  Mr.  Eockefeller,"  I  asked  presently,  "that 
since  the  Trust  is,  according  to  your  own  theory,  a  result  of 
overproduction,  it  means  that  we  are  approaching  a  time  when 
the  general  stoppage  of  this  unnecessary  production  hy  the 
trusts  will  have  the  tendency  to  create  an  unemployed  prob- 
lem?" 

"No,"  said  Mr.  Eockefeller,  "I  think  the  Trust,  by  regu- 
lating industry  and  systematizing  business,  will  help  keep 
up  this  present  prosperity.  We  have  never  had  such  a  period 
in  the  history  of  the  country  before,  and  yet  never  were  there 
so  many  trusts;  hence  it  cannot  be  said  that  trusts  prevent 
prosperity.  There  are  less  unemployed  men  than  ever  before 
known  in  the  history  of  the  country.  And,  anyway,  since  we 
are  both  agreed  that  an  anti-trust  law  is  absurd,  since  it  is 
attempting  to  prevent  the  consequences  of  over-production, 
how  would  you  propose  to  solve  the  Trust  Problem?" 

"Yes,  Mr.  Eockefeller,  I  am  as  much  aware  of  the  futility 
of  anti-trust  laws  as  you  are.  The  Socialist  remedy  for  the 
trusts  is  Government  Ownership." 

"Do  you  thing  the  Government  could  run  the  Standard  as 
well  as  we  run  it?"  asked  Mr.  Eockefeller. 

"I  would  not  be  positive  that  the  State  could  run  the 
trusts  any  better  than  you  and  Mr.  Morgan  do,  speaking 
from  the  standpoint  of  industrial  efficiency;  but  Government 
Ownership  is  a  necessary  basis  for  the  establishment  of  the 
co-operative  wage  system,  which  must  supersede  the  present 
competitive  system,  if  only  to  allow  us  to  escape  an  unem- 
ployed problem,  which  is  simply  the  result  of  competition 
among  laborers,  forcing  wages  down  so  low  that  the  laborer 
cannot  buy  what  he  produces." 

"But  we  have  no  'unemployed  problem/  We  never  had 
such  a  demand  for  labor  as  to-day,"  returned  Mr.  Eocke- 
feller. 

"Yes,  that  is  true,"  I  replied,  "but  I  am  looking  into  the 
future  and  can  see  an  inevitable  unemployed  problem  loom- 
ing up  there.  The  Trust  is  meeting  a  present  emergency, 
but  it  is  at  best  only  a  temporary  stop-gap,  and  is  not  in  the 
least  fitted  to  solve  the  unemployed  problem  of  the  future." 

"Well,  Mr.  Wilshire,  I  am  not  looking  ahead  as  far  as 


106  Socialism  Inevitable 

you  are.  Business  to-day  is  good,  and  I  think  it  will  con- 
tinue so.  If  it  does  not,  then  we  must  let  the  future  settle  its 
own  problems." 

"Well,  anyway,  Mr.  Kockefeller,  I  am  very  glad  to  have  had 
the  opportunity  of  talking  with  you,  for  I  feel  that  when  the 
industrial  crisis  does  come,  it  will  help  very  much  for  us  to 
understand  each  other's  position.  There  is  nothing  better 
than  having  men  like  you  and  me,  who,  after  all,  do  have 
a  common  interest,  coming  into  personal  contact  with  each 
other.  While  our  views  are  different,  yet  our  having  met 
will  lead  us  to  respect  the  sincerity  of  our  mutual  opinions 
and  personal  good  faith." 

"You  are  quite  right,  Mr.  Wilshire,"  said  Mr.  Rockefeller, 
"and  I  am  very  glad  to  have  had  the  pleasure  of  this  talk 
with  you." 

This  closed  the  interview  upon  the  Trust  Problem,  for, 
although  I  talked  with  Mr.  Rockefeller  a  number  of  times 
afterward,  it  was  nothing  but  "golf  and  weather." 

I  am  satisfied  from  this  talk  that  Mr.  Rockefeller  is  true 
to  himself.  He  thinks  he  is  right.  He  believes  that  his 
business  methods  have  not  only  been  the  best  for  himself  and 
his  fellow  stockholders,  but  also  for  the  public  generally. 
Mr.  Rockefeller  is  in  no  sense  a  man  of  theories.  He  sees  a 
present  necessity,  and  acts  upon  it  without  considering  what 
will  be  the  next  step.  He  is  democratic  and  without  envy 
in  his  manner  and  instincts,  and  I  am  sure  he  would  like  to 
have  all  his  brother  Americans  possess  as  much  money  as  he 
has.  Ostentation  is  an  unknown  word  to  him.  His  is  the 
instinct  of  the  coral  insect  that  thinks  of  nothing  more  than 
the  next  infinitesimal  layer  it  places  upon  the  coral  reef  that 
is  to  found  a  future  continent.  Mr.  Rockefeller  is  the  power 
behind  Mr.  Morgan's  throne,  and  remains  in  the  shadow, 
not  because  he  objects  to  the  world-glare  in  which  Mr.  Mor- 
gan basks,  but  simply  because  pomp  and  glory  are  matters 
of  indifference  to  him.  Some  newly  rich  men  envy  the  foot- 
men on  the  box  of  their  carriage,  owing  to  their  conspicuous 
position  and  their  gaudy  livery.  Mr.  Rockefeller  is  not  of 
that  sort.  He  rides  in  his  carriage,  not  to  exhibit  himself 
and  his  wealth,  but  to  "get  there,"  and  he  does  "get  there," 
too. 

I  do  not  think  this  is  at  all  an  unnatural  view  for  me  to 


A  Talk  With  Rockefeller  107 

take  of  Mr.  Rockefeller's  philosophy  of  life.  It  is  the  phil- 
osophy held  by  all  normal  men,  and  I  think  Mr.  Rockefeller 
perfectly  normal  except  for  his  having  an  unusual  ability  in 
the  art  of  making  money.  We  live  to  live,  not  to  let  other  peo- 
ple know  we  are  alive.  I  wear  clothes,  not  for  ornament,  but 
for  warmth,  just  as  I  attend  the  opera,  not  to  exhibit  myself 
to  other  people,  but  to  satisfy  my  ears  and  eyes.  The  squirrel 
does  not  lay  up  his  winter  store  of  nuts  in  order  to  make 
other  squirrels  envious  of  him,  nor  yet  to  have  them  admire 
his  wealth  and  foresight.  He  does  it  for  the  one  and  single 
purpose  of  feeding  himself  when  the  snow  covers  the  ground, 
and  when,  if  he  had  no  store  on  hand,  he  would  starve.  The 
bees  do  the  same;  and,  even  in  California,  where  there  are 
flowers  all  the  year  round,  follow  up  their  old  instinct,  de- 
veloped under  different  climatic  conditions,  of  gathering 
honey  for  a  winter  that  never  comes,  and  consequently  lay- 
ing up  immense  stores  of  honey  that  are  never  consumed  at 
all  and  simply  goes  to  waste,  unless  man,  wandering  in  the 
forest,  happens  accidentally  to  find  the  bee  tree. 

Mr.  Rockefeller  is  like  the  California  bee.  He  is  obeying 
a  fundamental  instinct  to  accumulate,  although  the  original 
incentive  for  laying  up  more  wealth  has  long  since  ceased. 
It  thus  becomes  as  much  a  part  of  his  life  to  go  on  accumu- 
lating surplus  wealth  as  it  is  for  the  California  bee  to  accu- 
mulate surplus  honey,  and  you  no  more  could  reason  Mr. 
Rockefeller  out  of  his  irresistible  instinct  than  you  could 
successfully  reason  with  the  bee.  For  even  suppose  you 
could  teach  a  bee  the  futility  of  gathering  honey  which  would 
never  be  eaten,  what  a  miserable  little  bee  you  would  make. 
How  could  the  poor  thing  pass  away  the  time  if  she  could 
not  gather  honey?  Would  you  teach  her  to  play  golf? 
Would  you  teach  her  to  gamble  with  her  sister  bees,  to  see 
which  should  have  the  most  of  the  useless  honey  that  no  bee 
wanted  anyway,  because  there  was  already  too  much  on  hand  ? 

No,  if  you  had  a  kind  heart  you  would  let  the  poor  bee 
go  on  gathering  honey  for  the  rest  of  her  life,  even  though 
you  knew  she  were  making  something  that  would  be  of  no  use. 
For  to  be  happy  she  must  be  a  busy  bee.  Her  problem  in 
life  is  not  to  own  honey,  but  to  make  honey.  I  don't  know 
that  Browning  was  thinking  of  either  busy  bees  or  busy 
Rockefellers  when  he  wrote : 


108  Socialism  Inevitable 

The  common  problem,  yours,  mine,  every  one's, 
Is — not  to  fancy  what  were  fair  in  life 
Provided  it  could  be — but,  finding  first 
What  may  be,  then,  how  to  make  it  fair 
Up  to  our  means;  a  very  different  thing! 

But  his  philosophy  was  all  right,  just  the  same. 

Now,  you  can't  introduce  any  game  to  a  bee  that  will 
allow  her  to  be  lazy,  and  yet  imagine  herself  a  busy  bee.  You 
can't  make  her  drunk,  for  instance,  and  make  her  think  she 
is  doing  great  stunts  in  the  honey-making  line,  while  as  a 
matter  of  fact  she  is  fast  asleep  in  the  club  window  of  the 
hive.  Neither  can  you  get  her  to  chase  around  the  golf  links 
of  a  honeyless  garden  pretending  to  gather  honey,  but  in 
reality  simply  playing  a  make-believe  game  of  life. 

But  with  Mr.  Eockefeller  it  is  quite  different.  He  has  a 
man's  imagination,  and  so  you  can  fool  him.  On  nice,  clear 
days  you  can  set  him  to  playing  golf,  whereupon  he  will  forget 
all  about  the  sterner  game  of  life  and  enjoy  the  imitation 
more  than  he  ever  enjoyed  the  real.  At  least,  he  thinks  he 
does,  which  is  the  same  thing.  Then,  on  rainy  days,  you 
can  let  him  stay  in  the  club,  and  by  sundry  and  judicious 
Scotch  high-balls  fool  him  into  thinking  he  is  doing  things 
when  in  reality  he  is  not  even  walking  around  the  golf  links. 
Verily,  it's  a  great  thing  to  be  a  man  rather  than  a  bee. 

But  there  is  another  difference,  too.  The  bee  gathers  her 
honey  in  a  fair  field,  one  that  is  freely  open  to  all  bees, 
whereas  Mr.  Eockefeller  gathers  his  honey  from  a  private 
preserve.  Here  we  have  a  great  United  States  Flower  Garden 
and  plenty  of  honey  for  all.  But,  years  ago,  our  grandfathers 
made  a  very  silly  arrangement  with  certain  people  whereby 
Mr.  Eockefeller  now  owns  the  greater  part  of  the  garden. 
We  gather  the  honey  for  him,  and  he  gives  us  just  enough  to 
keep  us  sufficiently  alive  that  we  may  fly  around  and  gather 
more.  I  say  this  was  a  silly  arrangement,  for  there  was  no 
reason  why  we  should  not,  in  our  own  country,  our  own 
United  States,  our  own  flower  garden,  have  all  the  honey 
we  gather  for  ourselves,  instead  of  giving  up  three-quarters 
to  capitalists  like  Mr.  Eockefeller  and  Mr.  Morgan.  However, 
our  grandfathers  made  the  agreement  and  we  seem  to  think 
that  we  not  only  cannot  back  out  of  it,  but  must,  in  turn, 
pledge  our  own  grandchildren  to  continue  the  arrangement. 


A  Talk  With  Rockefeller  109 

The  trouble  that  is  now  vexing  our  souls,  however,  is  a 
very  serious  one.  We  thought  our  contract  carried  with  it 
the  implication  that  as  long  as  we  were  willing  to  gather 
honey  from  the  National  Garden  for  Mr.  Rockefeller  and  Mr. 
Morgan,  they  would  be  willing  to  admit  us  to  the  field  to 
gather  it  and  get  our  quarter  share.  It  appears  we  made  a 
mistake.  Mr.  Rockefeller  now  says  that  he  has  all  the  honey 
he  wants,  and  that  there  is  no  use  of  our  gathering  what  he 
doesn't  require.  He  has  formed  his  Trust  for  the  express 
purpose  of  fencing  us  out  of  the  Garden  of  Earth,  and  we 
cannot  deny  that  he  has  much  more  honey  than  he  can  use, 
because  his  big  Standard  Hive  is  the  most  conspicuous  thing 
in  the  field. 

Now,  we  cannot  deny  that  our  labor  has  become  useless  to 
him,  for  he  has  all  he  wants ;  but,  on  the  other  hand,  we  also 
cannot  see  how  we  are  going  to  get  any  honey  for  ourselves 
when  the  big  Trust  screen  is  completed  and  we  are  denied 
access  to  the  Flower  Garden.  We  are  very  reluctantly  being 
forced  to  see  that  we  must  own  the  Earth  ourselves  if  we 
expect  to  have  the  right  at  any  and  all  times  of  entering  the 
Garden  to  supply  ourselves  with  the  needful  honey. 

When  the  Nation  owns  the  Trust  Hive,  all  of  us  American 
busy  bees  will  have  the  right  to  enter  and  make  honey  and 
partake  of  the  common  store  gathered  by  all.  So  if  we  wish 
to  have  what  is  really  ours,  let  us  get  busy.  Let  the  Nation 
own  the  Honey  Trust. 


110  Socialism  Inevitable 


THE  "MERGER"  DICISION 

(May,  1903.) 

THE  decision  of  the  United  States  Court  against  the 
validity  of  the  Northern  Securities  Company  is,  as 
has  well  been  said,  a  most  revolutionary  departure  in 
legal  matters.  In  fact  it  is  so  very  revolutionary  that  it  is 
plainly  unconstitutional,  and  I  have  no  doubt  that  the  Su- 
preme Court,  on  appeal,  will  so  declare  it.  The  very  essence 
of  the  right  of  private  property  is  the  right  of  disposal,  and  if 
a  law  preventing  disposal  of  property  is  declared  consti- 
tutional, then  the  constitution  must  part  with  its  time- 
honored  label  of  "protector  of  private  property." 

The  decision  is  in  effect  that  certain  private  persons,  to 
wit,  Mr.  Hill,  Mr.  Morgan  and  others,  have  not  the  right  to 
dispose  of  their  stock  in  the  Great  Northern  Eailway,  the 
Burlington  Eailway  and  the  Northern  Pacific  Eailway  to  the 
Northern  Securities  Company,  because  that  company  by  hold- 
ing the  stocks  in  these  various  roads,  effects  a  combination 
of  competitive  railways,  and  hence  deprives  the  public  of  the 
currently  supposed  benefits  of  competitive  railway  rates. 

It  seems  to  me  that  there  could  hardly  be  conceived  a 
more  absurd  law  than  one  which  says  to  a  man,  "You  must 
not  sell  your  horse  to  anyone  who  already  owns  a  horse,  and 
if  you  do,  we  will  make  the  purchaser  hunt  you  up,  return 
you  your  horse  and  take  his  money  back.  If  you  happen  to 
have  spent  the  money  meanwhile,  he  must  keep  the  horse 
until  you  get  some  more  money."  Now,  by  substituting  horse 
for  railway,  that  is,  the  old  for  the  modern  method  of  trans- 
portation, we  have  the  command  that  the  Circuit  Court  has 
issued  to  railway  owners.  Of  course  the  decision  will  only 
embarrass  Mr.  Morgan  until  he  gets  a  reversal  from  the  Su- 
preme Court,  but  to  think  that  it  will  permanently  prevent 
Mergers  is  purely  childish. 

For  the  time  being  Mr.  Morgan  may  be  held  up  in  his 
great  work  of  unifying  and  systematizing  the  railway  systems 
on  this  continent;  but  to  think  that  a  process  in  the  natural 


The  "Merger"  Decision  111 

development  of  industry  can  be  permanently  prevented,  is 
manifestly  absurd.  Even  in  the  unexpected  event  of  the 
United  States  Supreme  Court  affirming  the  decision  of  the 
Circuit  Court,  the  general  result  must  finally  be  the  same, 
viz.,  that  the  process  of  concentration  and  consolidation  will 
proceed,  although  with  a  possible  halt,  until  Mr.  Morgan  can 
find  a  way  around  the  obstacle.  When  a  huge  boulder  rolls 
down  the  mountain  side  into  a  stream  it  may  block  the  down- 
ward course  of  the  water  until  a  new  channel  is  cut  out,  and  the 
Merger  decision  may  in  the  same  way  delay  Mr.  Morgan  until 
he  can  cut  out  a  new  channel  for  the  rising  flood  of  com- 
bination. To  think  that  the  water  blocked  by  the  boulder 
will  not  be  able  to  find  a  new  channel  is  no  sillier  than  to 
imagine  that  Mr.  Morgan,  and  the  forces  he  stands  for,  will 
not  find  a  similar  outlet.    Necessity  makes  new  laws. 

The  president  of  the  Seaboard  Air  Line,  one  of  the  south- 
ern railways  that  Mr.  Morgan  is  preparing  to  merge  in  his 
Southern  Securities  Company  as  soon  as  he  sees  the  legal 
coast  clear,  has  expressed  great  satisfaction  at  this  Merger 
decision.  Quite  naturally,  too,  since  he  is  one  of  the  useless 
presidents  that  Mr.  Morgan  will  eliminate  when  he  effects 
his  southern  combination.  In  like  manner,  no  doubt,  the  little 
retail  dry  goods  merchants  who  are  being  displaced  by  the 
big  department  stores,  would  like  a  Merger  decision  that  would 
guarantee  them  their  positions.  I  am  aware  that  the  Sea- 
board president,  a  Southern  Colonel,  sah,  would  be  deadly 
insulted  if  he  knew  I  classed  him  with  a  miserable  village 
merchant,  but  I  have  also  little  doubt  that  a  few  years  ago  he 
would  have  thought  it  impossible  that  he,  a  great  capitalist, 
should  ever  use  such  revolutionary  language,  as  the  following, 
which  the  Press  ascribes  to  him: 

It  is  idle  to  talk  of  a  political  republic  with  a  financial 
tyranny;  there  is  no  more  safety  in  having  commerce  at  the  mercy 
of  an  absolute  ruler  than  there  would  be  in  having  our  govern- 
ment controlled  by  a  czar  who  might  be  a  benevolent  or  cruel 
one,  according  to  his  whim  or  ability,  or  to  the  circumstances. 

It's  amusing  that  he  seems  to  think  that  the  United  States 
is  not  already  under  an  industrial  tyranny  simply  because  he 
happens  to  belong  to  the  tyrants  himself.  Let  Mr.  Morgan 
absorb  the  Seaboard  Air  Lane  and  throw  him  out  and  then 
the  shoe  is  on  the  other  foot  and  the  Colonel  roars  "TY- 
KANNY!" 


112  Socialism  Inevitable 


HOP  LEE  AND  THE  PELICAN 

(May,   1903.) 

HOP  LEE  was  an  intelligent  young  Chinaman,  born  of 
poor  but  honest  parents,  upon  the  banks  of  the 
Yellow  River.  From  early  childhood  he  had  been 
accustomed  to  assist  in  getting  a  living  for  himself  and  the 
other  members  of  his  family  by  fishing  with  the  ordinary 
rod  and  line,  but  although  this  primitive  method  of  gaining 
a  livelihood  had  been  followed  by  his  forefathers  for  many 
centuries,  it  remained  for  Hop  Lee  so  to  improve  upon  it  that 
he  could  live  sumptuously  without  working ;  and  this  tale  is  to 
show  how  successfully  he  carried  out  his  plan. 

It  was  not  so  much  through  a  brilliant  burst  of  genius  as 
by  the  spur  of  necessity  that  Hoppy  made  his  great  discovery. 
As  he  sat  on  the  bank  with  his  empty  basket  beside  him,  and 
fished  in  vain,  day  after  day,  he  watched  with  deep  chagrin 
a  gay  flock  of  pelicans  that  came  down  upon  the  waters  in 
which  he,  alas,  fished  so  fruitlessly,  and  filled  themselves 
to  repletion.  And  not  only  was  he  envious  of  the  success  of 
the  pelicans,  but  he  realized  that  their  noise  and  splashing 
drove  many  fish  away  from  his  hook  which  might  otherwise 
have  been  caught. 

Poor  Hoppy  pondered  long  upon  this  distressing  situation 
and  moodily  watched  the  pelicans  as  they  dived  to  the  bottom 
of  the  river,  waving  their  web-feet  in  the  air,  and  triumph- 
antly brought  up  fish  after  fish  which  they  stored  away  in 
their  pouches,  to  be  devoured  at  leisure  or  fed  to  their  young. 
Finally,  however,  a  brilliant  idea  occurred  to  him  whereby  he 
would  not  only  prevent  the  birds  from  driving  his  fish  away, 
but  would  actually  compel  them  to  deliver  what  they  caught 
to  him,  and  so  fill  up  his  empty  basket.  But  how  was  he  to 
put  his  ingenious  plan  in  operation?  Flattery,  he  decided, 
would  be  the  key  to  success. 

Just  how  he  managed  it  I  don't  pretend  to  know,  but 
some  way  or  other  he  learned  the  pelican  language,  which 


Hop  Lee  and  the  Pelican  113 

was  the  first  step  toward  his  goal.  Next  he  procured  a  pol- 
ished ring  of  brass,  and,  betaking  himself  bright  and  early 
one  morning  to  his  post  on  the  river  bank,  he  blandly  ad- 
dressed the  pelicans  as  they  glided  by,  till  finally  one  of  them 
stopped  for  a  little  chat.  Hoppy  at  once  seized  his  opportu- 
nity, and  with  soft,  insidious  words  beguiled  the  foolish  bird 
to  the  bank,  whereupon  he  proceeded  to  tell  it  how  much  its 
wonderful  pelicanic  beauty  would  be  enhanced  by  a  lovely 
necklace  such  as  the  one  he  held  in  his  hand.  Would  it  not 
allow  him  the  pleasure  of  placing  the  necklace  around  its  grace- 
ful neck  ?  The  pelican,  highly  flattered,  consented  to  be  deco- 
rated, and  fairly  beamed  with  delight  when  it  felt  the  pres- 
sure of  the  encircling  metal. 

To  Hoppy,  however,  the  ring  was  strictly  an  object  of  util- 
ity. As  soon  as  it  was  around  the  pelican's  neck,  the  unlucky 
bird  found  itself  unable  to  swallow  the  fish  it  caught;  and, 
after  almost  choking  to  death  several  times,  appealed,  in 
desperation,  to  Hoppy  to  save  its  life.  Hoppy,  who  was  at 
hand  upon  the  bank  eagerly  awaiting  developments,  was  only 
too  glad  to  spring  to  its  assistance,  and,  by  removing  the 
fish  from  its  throat,  prevented  its  untimely  demise. 

The  pelican's  gratitude  and  joy  were  unbounded.  It  felt  its 
palpitating  heart  sink  back  from  its  throat  into  its  breast ;  but 
it  also  saw  the  fish  pass  out  of  its  throat  into  Hoppy' s  basket. 
Its  distressed  throat,  in  fact,  was  relieved  of  a  heart  and  a 
fish  at  the  same  time. 

Hoppy  then  proceeded  in  a  friendly  tone  to  counsel  the 
pelican.  "You  can  easily  see,"  he  said,  "that  you  cannot  con- 
tinue to  wear  that  ornamental  ring  about  your  neck  and  at 
the  same  time  swallow  so  large  a  fish  as  you  used  to.  Of 
course  I  know  you  do  not  wish  to  part  with  such  a  thing  of 
beauty  merely  for  the  sake  of  having  your  stomach  filled. 
Now  that  you  have  seen  how  beautiful  it  has  made  you,  I 
am  sure  that  you  will  feel  there  is  no  way  of  living  without 
it.  One  gets  used  to  luxuries  so  quickly  that  they  become 
necessities.  So,  in  future,  when  you  catch  a  fish  you  must 
always  come  to  me  to  be  relieved,  and  I  will  be  ready  and  only 
too  glad  to  help  you.  Of  course,  I  will  see  that  you  shall  be 
fed.  I  will  take  the  fish  to  my  chopping  block,  and  cut  off 
as  large  a  piece  as  you  can  politely  swallow.  In  this  way 
your  life  will  be  saved,  and  you  will  be  fed  with  morsels  of 


114  Socialism  Inevitable 

food  of  a  size  suitable  to  your  new  and  improved  condition. 
At  the  same  time  I,  too,  will  be  fed  by  taking  the  fish  that 
you  are  now  unable  to  swallow,  as  a  small  return  for  the 
assistance  I  shall  lend  you." 

Hop  Lee  had  made  a  grand  discovery — how  to  live  without 
working — and  at  the  same  time  had  convinced  the  pelican 
that  it  was  only  through  the  exercise  of  his  great  brain  power 
and  generosity  that  it  was  able  to  escape  being  choked  to 
death  when  it  tried  to  eat  the  fish  it  caught. 

He,  of  course,  waxed  fat  on  such  an  arrangement.  After 
the  first  pelican  had  shown  itself,  all  the  others  were  anxious 
to  get  rings  about  their  necks  to  be  in  the  fashion,  and  very 
soon  Hoppy  had  all  the  pelicans  on  the  river  busily  and 
cheerfully  engaged  in  catching  fish  for  him.  And  so,  even  to 
this  day,  Hop  Lee  and  all  his  descendants  enjoy  the  prospect 
of  living  indefinitely  on  the  banks  of  the  Yellow  Eiver  in 
ease  and  plenty. 

Now  it  happened  that  after  he  had  acquired  great  wealth, 
Hoppy  made  a  tour  of  the  world,  and  was  so  fortunate,  whije 
in  America,  as  to  be  introduced  to  Mr.  Pierpont  Morgan. 
It  is  related  on  good  authority  that  he  was  highly  amused  at 
the  striking  resemblance  between  that  gentleman's  ideas  and 
his  own,  for  he  saw  immediately  that  the  American  working- 
man  has  put  a  ring  about  his  throat  which  forces  him  to 
give  up  the  fish  he  catches  to  Mr.  Morgan,  and  to  be  satisfied 
himself  with  a  tail  diet.  "The  ring  is  a  little  less  tangible, 
to  be  sure,  than  that  about  the  necks  of  our  pelicans/'  thought 
Hoppy,  "but  it  amounts  to  the  same  thing/' 

It  certainly  does.  The  competitive  wage-system  forces  the 
laborer  to  take  a  wage  that  will  just  give  him  a  living.  He 
cannot  ask  for  more,  because  there  are  plenty  of  men  waiting 
for  the  chance  to  work  upon  the  basis  of  the  fish-tail  diet. 
And  so  long  as  pelicans,  or  workingmen,  are  satisfied  with 
fish-tails  there  is  no  use  giving  them  more.  Hence  the 
American  workingman  produces  his  $2,400  a  year  and  gives 
up  all  but  the  $400  fish-tail  to  Mr.  Morgan,  just  as  the  pelican 
catches  2,400  pounds  of  good  fish  and  gets  only  400  pounds 
of  fish-tails  in  return;  yet  both  get  down  on  their  knees  and 
thank  God  that  such  men  as  Hop  Lee  and  Morgan  live  to 
prevent  pelicans  and  workingmen  from  starving  to  death. 

Hoppy  congratulated  himself,  however,  on  being  in  a  much 


Hop  Lee  and  the  Pelican  115 

safer  position  than  Mr.  Morgan,  for  if  his  pelicans  should 
ever  get  over  their  feeling  of  gratitude  and  pride  in  their 
rings  they  could  not  get  them  off,  even  if  they  wished; 
whereas  Mr.  Morgan's  pelican  workingmen  always  have  the 
opportunity  of  removing  the  competitive  rings  from  their 
necks.  The  American  pelicans,  in  short,  have  merely  to 
"wish  the  ring  off/'  and  off  it  goes. 

The  way  for  them  to  express  this  wish  is  to  vote  for  Social- 
ism, as  a  great  many  American  pelicans  did  at  the  last 
election.  Unfortunately,  however,  there  were  still  more  who 
wished  to  continue  wearing  it,  so  that  Mr.  Morgan  still  gets 
the  fish,  and  Uncle  Sam  the  tail, 


116  Socialism  Inevitable 


COFFEE,  CURRANTS  AND  ORANGES 

(August,  1903.) 

AS  a  very  tangible  evidence  of  the  inability  of  society  to 
distribute  the  wealth  that  is  produced  under  our  pres- 
ent competitive  system,  it  is  interesting  to  note  the 
overproduction  of  three  great  staple  products,  viz.,  coffee  in 
Brazil,  currants  in  Greece,  and  oranges  in  California. 

Ordinary  agricultural  products,  such  as  wheat  or  corn,  which 
are  planted  from  year  to  year,  can  be  restricted  in  production, 
when  the  price  falls  too  low,  by  the  simple  process  of  refraining 
from  planting.  But  with  a  crop  like  oranges,  growing  on 
trees  which  require  great  expense  in  the  planting,  and  culture 
for  years  before  maturity,  it  is  self-evident  that  one  or  two 
years  of  low  prices  will  not  force  the  growers  to  lose  all  the 
money  invested  by  abandoning  their  orchards.  For  an  or- 
chard, it  is  to  be  remembered,  if  neglected,  goes  to  ruin.  And 
the  same  applies  to  the  coffee  plantations  and  currant  vine- 
yards. Hence  when  overproduction  ensues  in  crops  of  this 
nature  the  planter  is  face  to  face  with  a  very  serious  prob- 
lem. He  must  go  to  the  expense  of  taking  care  of  his  orchard 
or  vineyard,  and  he  has  a  crop  forced  on  his  hands  which  he 
cannot  dispose  of. 

From  the  following  item,  taken  from  the  New  York  Com~ 
mercial,  of  recent  date,  it  will  be  seen  the  conditions  in 
Brazil  are  so  desperate  that  the  Government  is  proposing  to 
destroy  one-fifth  of  the  crop : 

The  forty-fifth  annual  report  of  the  Chamber  of  Commerce  for 
the  official  year  1902-3  was  made  public  yesterday.  The  proceed- 
ings of  the  Chamber  for  the  year  ending  April  30,  1903,  together 
with  the  roll  of  members,  officers  and  committees,  constitution 
and  by-laws,  comprise  the  first  part  of  the  volume.  The  second 
part  contains  trade  reviews  and  statistical  statements  of  trade 
and  finance. 

The  report  says:  "The  coffee  markets  of  the  world  have  been 
overshadowed  by  the  enormous  yield  of  the  Brazilian  crop,  which 
has  been  of  increasing  rather  than  of  diminishing  proportions, 


Coffee,  Currants  and  Oranges  117 

and  has  afforded  very  little  opportunity  for  the  development  of 
bullish  features.  The  crop  of  1901-1902  was  more  than  the  whole 
world's  yearly  consumption,  and  this  was  followed  by  a  crop 
that  very  nearly  equaled  it  in  size,  while  the  present  prospect  is 
that  the  crop  due  July  1  will  exceed  all  its  predecessors,  the 
estimates  foreshadowing  a  production  of  16,000,000  bags. 

"This  enormous  expansion  is  the  result  of  the  plan  of  agricul- 
tural development  adopted  several  years  ago,  and  which  resulted 
in  converting  a  large  acreage  of  wild  land  into  coffee  plantations. 
The  new  trees,  which  require  three  years  to  mature,  have  grad- 
ually swelled  the  proportions  of  the  crop,  until  now  planters  are 
just  as  anxious  to  restrict  the  yield,  and  various  plans  have  been 
discussed,  but  the  only  one  that  has  in  any  way  materialized  is 
the  tax  in  kind  levied  in  the  State  of  San  Paulo,  which  is  to  go 
in  operation  July  1;  under  the  provisions  of  this  law  planters 
will  he  required  to  hand  over  to  the  Government  20  per  cent,  of 
their  shipments. 

"Thus,  if  an  order  for  1,000  bags  is  received,  the  planter  will 
be  required  to  send  to  the  Government  agent  200  bags  to  be  de- 
stroyed, that  is,  burned  up.  It  is  said  that  this  measure  cannot 
be  practically  carried  out,  and  that  it  will  fail,  especially  as  it  is 
to  be  enforced  in  only  one  of  the  five  coffee-growing  States.  Dur- 
ing the  month  of  August  a  New  York  syndicate,  that  had  a  large 
speculative  interest  in  the  market,  endeavored  to  advance  prices 
by  manipulation,  but  although  they  were  aided  by  a  temporary 
drought  and  a  light  frost,  they  relinquished  the  contract." 

In  Greece,  where  there  is  an  overproduction  of  currants — 
it  may  be  mentioned  that  currants  of  commerce  are  not  the 
garden  currants  that  we  know  in  America,  but  a  small  grape 
— the  Government  is  also  arranging  to  have  a  part  of  the 
crop  destroyed  and  is  passing  strict  laws  against  the  further 
extension  of  planting.  In  California  the  orange  growers  are 
not  sufficiently  organized  as  yet  to  have  part  of  the  oranges 
destroyed  in  order  to  be  able  to  sell  the  remainder  at  a  living 
profit,  nevertheless,  there  is  no  question  but  this  is  what 
must  ultimately  be  done.  For  the  price  of  the  surplus  de- 
termines the  price  of  the  whole.  If  the  surplus  sells  at  a 
loss,  the  entire  crop  sells  at  a  loss.  For  instance,  if  there  are 
a  million  boxes  of  oranges  for  sale,  and  there  is  a  demand  for 
only  900,000,  then  the  extra  hundred  thousand  must  be 
slaughtered  at  any  price,  and  the  price  upon  this  hundred 
thousand  will  apply  to  the  whole  million.  It  is  evident  there- 
fore, there  being  a  market  for  900,000,  that  it  is  better  to 
destroy  the  100,000  and  get  a  living  price  for  the  remaining 
900,000  than  to  try  and  sell  the  whole  million  at  a  loss. 


118  Socialism  Inevitable 

That  is,  the  total  returns  to  the  growers  for  the  900,000 
boxes  at  a  high  price  will  be  much  better  than  for  the  million 
boxes  at  a  low  price. 

The  problem  the  California  growers  have  to  solve,  however, 
is  how  to  compensate  the  growers  of  the  100,000  boxes  which 
should  be  destroyed.  This  would  necessitate  such  a  close 
organization  that  it  is  very  problematical  whether  it  can  be 
formed  until  the  growers  have  become  better  disciplined. 

Of  course  all  this  discussion  about  destroying  the  fruits  of 
the  earth  when  so  many  people  need  them,  would  seem  absurd 
if  it  be  not  always  remembered  that  we  are  living  under  an 
absurd  system.  Here  we  have  the  earth  so  prolific  that  we 
are  actually  threatened  with  starvation  unless  we  destroy  some 
of  the  food  which  we  have  produced.  When  we  abolish  our 
competitive  system  and  introduce  a  co-operative  system  of 
distribution,  we  will  never  raise  more  than  we  need,  because 
production  will  be  systematically  planned ;  and  if  at  any  time 
we  find  that  more  labor  is  directed  toward  the  production  of 
a  certain  commodity  than  is  required,  it  will  mean  either  a 
reduction  in  the  hours  of  labor  or  the  transfer  of  the  laborers 
to  some  other  industry.  To-day,  however,  our  competitive 
wage  system  so  limits  the  effective  demand  of  the  people  that 
it  is  folly  for  us  to  expect  consumption  to  keep  up  with  pro- 
duction, 


A  Financial  Cataclysm  Inevitable     119 


a  financial  cataclysm  inevitable 

(August,  1903O 

ALL  political  questions  to-day  resolve  themselves  into  the 
one  problem :  how  can  a  man  get  a  just  equivalent  for 
his  labor?  I  doubt  if  there  is  a  single  issue,  which, 
upon  analysis,  cannot  be  reduced  to  this  simple  proposition, 
or  if  the  term  be  preferred,  to  the  question  of  distribution. 

The  problem  of  the  production  of  commodities  sufficient 
for  the  wants  of  the  earth's  inhabitants  has  been  completely 
solved,  and  we  no  longer  talk  of  the  growth  of  population 
exceeding  productivity.  But  the  equally  vital  problem  of 
distribution  is  still  with  us,  an  increasing  menace  to  our  very 
existence. 

Now  it  would  hardly  seem  necessary  to  emphasize  the  fact, 
it  is  so  self-evident,  that  our  competitive  wage  system  by 
limiting  the  laborer  to  the  wage  demanded  by  his  unemployed 
fellow-laborer,  thereby  restricts  his  powers  of  consumption 
to  the  mere  minimum  of  existence.  Yet  the  fact  is  one  that  is 
being  constantly  overlooked,  an  oversight  that  is  responsible 
for  no  small  proportion  of  the  errors  in  our  so-called  science 
of  political  economy.  There  was  a  time  when  all  the  pro- 
fessors of  political  economy  said  that  any  theory  which  in- 
volved the  admission  that  there  could  be  such  a  thing  as 
general  overproduction  was,  upon  the  face  of  it,  absurd ;  that 
it  was  impossible  and  absurd  to  conceive  that  the  earth  should 
produce  so  much  food  and  clothing  that  the  people  could  not 
get  enough.  They  said  that  the  explanation  of  an  apparent 
condition  of  overproduction  was  that  it  was  purely  local.  If 
the  Canadians,  for  instance,  were  producing  more  wheat 
than  they  wanted,  and  the  Cubans  were  growing  more  bananas 
than  they  wanted,  matters  would  adjust  themselves  as  soon 
as  both  Canadians  and  Cubans  became  aware  of  the  actual 
conditions.  As  soon  as  this  knowledge  should  prevail,  an 
exchange  would  be  made  whereupon  the  whole  problem  would 
be  solved. 


120  Socialism  Inevitable 

It  is,  of  course,  true  enough  that  often  under  our  com- 
petitive system  there  are  conditions  wherein  there  is  over- 
production of  a  certain  commodity  in  a  certain  place,  and 
that  a  proper  commercial  knowledge  of  this  condition  would 
so  facilitate  the  distribution  of  the  excess  product  that  the 
overproduction  would  soon  be  relieved,  and  normal  conditions 
re-established.  But  taking  a  more  general  view,  and  realiz- 
ing that  the  competitive  wage  system  exists  throughout  the 
civilized  world,  it  cannot  be  lost  sight  of  for  a  moment  that 
it  is  easily  possible  to  have  general  "overproduction"  simply 
because  we  have  an  inadequate  system  of  distribution,  a  system 
that  fails  to  distribute  the  products  of  labor  among  those 
who  produce  it,  viz.,  the  workers. 

It  will  at  once  be  urged  that  if  competition  limits  the 
laborers'  consumption  so  that  overproduction  must  ensue, 
how  is  it  that  we  do  not  have  overproduction  continuously,  and 
why  have  we  not  been  compelled  long  ago  to  abandon  our 
competitive  system  ?  The  reason  is  that  overproduction  arises 
from  the  use  of  machinery,  and  as  the  era  of  modern  machinery 
began  little  more  than  fifty  years  ago,  the  problem  must 
necessarily  be  of  comparatively  recent  origin.  Much  of  this 
time,  moreover,  we  have  been  utilizing  the  surplus,  above  and 
beyond  what  the  laborers  consume,  in  the  production  of  more 
and  more  machinery. 

Now  if  this  process  of  transforming  the  surplus  into  new 
machinery  could  continue  forever  there  would  never  be  any 
permanently  insoluble  unemployed  problem.  There  might 
be  temporary  crises  and  local  states  of  overproduction;  but 
the  capitalists  would  eventually  discover  where  machinery  and 
labor  were  most  needed,  and  would  so  be  able  to  alleviate 
any  local  unemployed  problems.  For  the  capitalist  to-day 
has  a  universal  eye.  Kailroads  in  China,  oil  refineries  in 
Eussia,  cotton  mills  in  India — he  furnishes  them  all,  quite 
indifferent  as  to  nationality.  When  a  system  of  underground 
electric  railroads  is  needed  in  London,  and  the  British  capital- 
ist cannot  see  that  it  will  be  a  profitable  undertaking,  an 
American  sees  differently  and  builds  them.  The  capitalist 
is  a  man  to  whom  patriotism  is  not  even  a  last  refuge;  he 
never  considers  it  at  all.  Whatever  country  needs  his  money 
gets  it,  the  only  condition  being  that  he  is  guaranteed  safety 
and  a  return  of  dividends. 


A  Financial  Cataclysm  Inevitable  121 

In  whatever  country  he  may  invest  his  money,  however, 
it  will  be  found  upon  ultimate  analysis  that  he  is  building 
this  machinery  in  order  to  feed  and  clothe  the  working  class 
and  the  farmers.  Not  that  he  has  any  philanthropic  reasons 
for  this  procedure,  but  simply  because  these  constitute  the 
only  body  of  consumers  that  is  of  sufficient  importance  to 
be  considered.  It  is  true  that  capital  may  be  invested  in  a 
steel  mill  in  Pittsburg,  and  it  may  appear  that  because  the 
steel  rail  is  sold  to  the  Vanderbilts  for  their  railways,  that 
this  is  an  undertaking  which  cannot  be  classed  with  those 
giving  food  and  clothing  to  the  working  class.  Yet  it  must 
be  remembered  that  Vanderbilt  buys  steel  rails  only  for  use 
upon  railroads  which  are  to  be  used  largely  to  carry  wheat 
and  pork  and  cloth  for  distribution  to  the  aforesaid  workers. 
So,  whichever  way  we  may  look  we  will  always  discover  that 
although  the  commodity  turned  out  by  the  capitalist  cannot 
itself  be  consumed  by  the  worker,  still  it  is  indirectly  connected 
with  some  industry  that  produces  a  commodity  for  the  work- 
ingman's  direct  consumption,  that  is,  his  food,  his  clothing, 
or  his  house. 

Hence  our  whole  system  of  industry  is  an  inverted  pyramid, 
its  apex  being  the  consumptive  ability  of  the  worker.  This 
ability  to  consume,  being  strictly  limited  by  the  competitive 
nature  of  the  system,  the  pyramid  can  remain  where  it  is 
only  by  means  of  the  continued  production  of  labor-saving 
machinery.  For  example,  we  build  a  steel  mill,  and  find  out 
that  by  building  a  larger  and  better  one,  we  can  save  labor. 
We  dismantle  the  first  mill  and  build  a  second,  and  when 
this  is  finished  we  may  go  through  a  similar  process  and  build 
even  a  third  with  a  still  better  equipment.  Seventy  years 
ago  we  built  an  Erie  Canal  which  carried  water  four  feet 
in  depth,  and  accommodated  a  canal  boat  of  seventy-five 
tons.  Then  we  deepened  it  to  seven  feet,  which  accommodated 
boats  of  250  tons;  while  our  present  plan  calls  for  a  depth 
of  twelve  feet,  to  admit  vessels  of  1,000  tons.  And  it  is 
possible  that  in  ten  or  fifteen  years  we  may  decide  to  enlarge 
again  and  have  ships  of  2,000  tons. 

Now  all  this  construction  of  new  iron  mills,  new  canals, 
etc.,  means  the  opening  of  so  many  new  channels  for  the 
distribution  of  the  surplus  products  made  by  labor;  and  if, 
as  said,  this  could  be  continued  indefinitely  and  upon  a  large 


122  Socialism  Inevitable 

enough  scale  there  would  never  be  any  question  about  the 
continuance  of  prosperity  and  constant  employment  for  the 
workingman.  Of  course  this  would  be  simply  building  canals 
and  mills  in  order  to  give  ourselves  employment,  much  in 
the  way  that  men  upon  a  warship  are  kept  holystoning  the 
decks;  and  there  are  a  good  many  people  who  imagine  that 
this  is  the  highest  and  best  life  to  live. 

However,  as  the  machinery  is  built  expressly  to  furnish 
goods  to  the  laborers,  and  as  the  laborers'  capacity  to  consume 
is  limited  by  their  wages  to  a  mere  minimum  of  existence, 
it  is  evident  that  the  day  will  finally  come  when  we  will 
have  too  much  machinery.  And  the  Trust  is  the  sign  that 
that  day  is  at  hand,  its  very  existence  being  a  proof  of  over- 
production, since  it  means  the  recognition  by  the  capitalist 
class  that  our  industrial  machinery  has  attained  a  stage  of 
practical  completion. 

That  continued  expansion,  though  impossible,  is  necessary 
for  the  perpetuation  of  the  existing  commercial  system  is 
well  known,  and  admitted  by  all  competent  writers  upon  the 
subject.  For  instance,  there  recently  appeared  a  very  striking 
article  in  the  New  York  Sun,  which  is  so  able  that  I  have 
decided  to  incorporate  it  bodily  herewith: 

WE  NEED  LARGER  FOREIGN  MARKETS. 

The  market  value  of  the  manufactured  products  of  the  United 
States  for  1902  was,  approximately,  $15,000,000,000.  This  is  the 
product  of  more  than  half  a  million  establishments,  whose  total 
capitalization  exceeds  $10,000,000,000,  and  in  which  some  seven 
million  of  our  people  find  employment.  This  truly  enormous 
business  becomes  only  the  more  imposing  when  one  realizes  how 
large  a  percentage  of  it  is  of  recent  development.  Within  a 
quarter  of  a  century  the  number  of  our  factories  has  doubled, 
their  capitalization  has  quadrupled,  the  number  of  their  em- 
ployees has  increased  nearly  three  times,  and  the  value  of  their 
output  has  grown  from  the  $5,500,000,000  of  1880  to  the  $15,000,- 
000,000  of  1902. 

In  connection  with  such  a  statement  there  arises,  naturally,  a 
question  of  the  disposition  of  so  enormous  a  quantity  of  mer- 
chandise. Where  does  it  go?  Who  uses  it?  It  is  probable  that 
the  off-hand  judgment  of  many  would  declare  that  much  of  the 
increase  was  due  to  the  increase  in  our  export  trade.  Yet  the 
fact  is  that  we  export  only  about  3  per  cent,  of  it.  Of  the  Ameri- 
can manufactured  wares  of  1902,  97  per  cent,  in  value  was  con- 
sumed in  the  best  market  which  the  United  States  has — the 
domestic.  It  went  to  a  trade  with  which  the  American  manu- 
facturer is  familiar— to  customers  whose  wants,  habits  and  tastes 


A  Financial  Cataclysm  Inevitable     123 

he  understands.  It  was  sold  under  commercial  laws  and  financial 
conditions  with  which  he  is  fully  acquainted.  The  American 
manufacturer  knows  his  home  trade,  knows  how  to  get  it,  and 
caters  to  it.  He  studies  the  requirements  of  his  market,  and  that 
market  is  at  all  times  quickly  and  easily  reached.  Credit  sys- 
tems, banking  and  transportation  facilities  make  his  domestic 
trade  a  simple  process  in  comparison  with  export  trade.  For 
these  reasons  American  energy  is  bent  toward  securing  and 
holding  American  trade  against  both  domestic  and  foreign  com- 
petition. 

But  there  is  another  side  to  this  trade  question  which  is 
growing  beyond  general  realization.  Within  a  quarter  of  a 
century  the  output  of  manufactured  products  has  increased  200 
per  cent.  Actual  producing  capacity  has  probably  increased 
much  beyond  that,  inasmuch  as  few  establishments  are  run  con- 
tinually to  the  full  extent  of  their  producing  power.  But  the 
number  of  domestic  consumers  has  increased  only  a  little  more 
than  50  per  cent,  within  the  same  period.  Two  influences  appear. 
One  is  that  we  now  manufacture  at  home  many  of  those  articles 
which  twenty-five  years  ago  we  imported.  The  other  is  that 
the  consuming  capacity  of  our  population  has  increased  more 
rapidly  than  has  the  number  of  consumers.  Standards  of  living 
are  higher  and  individual  requirements  are  greater  than  they 
were  a  quarter  of  a  century  ago.  Individual  wants  increase  with 
the  ability  of  the  individual  to  gratify  them,  and  national  pros- 
perity has  transformed  much  that  was  a  luxury  of  the  last 
generation  into  an  ordinary  comfort  or  a  seeming  necessity  for 
the  present  generation.  Yet,  even  with  these  important  in- 
fluences, the  fact  stands  that  consuming  power  has  not  kept  pace 
with  the  vast  increase  in  producing  power,  and  American  manu- 
facturers are  coming  into  more  and  more  direct  confrontation 
with  an  ever-increasing  surplus  of  manufactured  wares  beyond 
the  requirements  of  the  home  market. 

There  are  two  lines  of  possible  determination  of  the  question, 
and  only  two.  One  is  limitation  of  output,  the  other  an  exten- 
sion of  markets. 

We  look  at  our  export  trade  in  manufactured  goods  and  see 
its  increase  from  $100,000,000  in  1880  to  $150,000,000  in  1890,  and 
then  its  tremendous  leap  to  more  than  $400,000,000  in  1902.  The 
dazzle  of  these  figures  blinds  us  to  their  real  significance. 
Diverted  by  a  striking  incident,  we  lose  sight  of  the  main  issue. 
That  issue  does  not  lie  in  the  mere  fact  that  there  has  been  a 
very  gratifying  increase.  It  rests  in  the  question  of  the  great 
probability  of  serious  reaction  upon  domestic  interests  if  that 
export  trade  be  not  indefinitely  extended  within  the  near  future. 

Already  careful  students  of  the  situation  are  asking  each  other 
how  long  we  can  continue  to  absorb  at  home  a  percentage  of  our 
products  which  will  avert  glutted  markets  and  depreciated  prices. 
Let  there  be  assumed  a  continuance  of  our  present  prosperity,  of 
big  crops  and  busy  mills  and  well  paid  labor.  There  must  be  an 
even  greater  prosperity  and  even  bigger  crops,  with  a  profitable 


124  Socialism  Inevitable 

market  for  them,  if  the  ever-increasing  mills  are  to  find  a  domes- 
tic market  for  their  ever-increasing  production.  Closely  inter- 
woven as  our  industries  are,  a  cessation  of  activity  in  any  one  of 
our  leading  lines  reacts  upon  other  lines.  The  cry  of  "over- 
production" or  of  "underproduction,"  call  it  which  you  will,  is 
quickly  raised,  and  commercial  uncertainty  paves  the  way  to 
commercial  stagnation.  A  market  clogged  with  the  products  of 
our  factories  compels  the  stoppage  of  production,  limits  the 
general  consuming  power,  enforces  general  economy  in  the 
household,  and  opens  the  door  to  hard  times. 

It  has  pleased  various  writers  and  public  officials  to  regale  us 
with  exuberant  tales  of  the  "American  invasion"  of  this,  that  and 
the  other  market.  As  yet  our  exports  of  manufactured  goods 
fill  only  a  very  small  hole  in  the  world's  markets,  and  our  in- 
creased exports  are  not  due  so  much  to  our  inroads  upon  the 
trade  of  our  competitors  as  they  are  to  our  participation  in  a 
general  increase  of  world  business.  That  our  export  trade  in 
manufactured  goods  has  grown  is  as  gratifying  as  it  is  undeni- 
able. But  there  are  these  three  facts  which  remain  for  the 
thoughtful  consideration  of  our  commercial  and  financial  classes: 

1.  That  we  now  export  only  3  per  cent,  of  the  products  of  our 
shops,  mills  and  factories. 

2.  That  we  now  secure  only  about  10  per  cent,  of  the  world's 
import  trade  in  manufactured  goods. 

3.  That  our  market  is  not  keeping  pace  with  our  increasing 
facilities  for  production. 

Stagnation  in  American  factories  is  now  only  less  pregnant 
with  menace  to  American  interests  than  is  failure  in  our  crops. 

It  will  be  noticed  that  the  Sun  never  considers  that  the 
only  way  to  get  a  greater  domestic  market  is  to  increase  the 
wages  of  what  it  terms  "well-paid  labor."  But  ignoring  this 
self-evident  solution  is  characteristic  of  all  such  attempts  to 
solve  the  current  industrial  problem.  Of  course,  to  increase 
wages  to  any  considerable  degree  under  a  competitive  system 
is  practically  impossible.  The  trades  unions  are  doing  a 
great  deal,  but  their  efforts  apply  to  only  a  small  proportion 
of  the  wage-earning  class,  and  even  when  they  do  get  what 
they  demand,  the  total  increase  is  so  small  that  it  makes  no 
appreciable  reduction  of  the  surplus  produced  above  and 
beyond  what  their  wages  allow  them  to  buy. 

The  solution  of  the  problem  can  be  found  only  in  the  co- 
operative wage  system,  and  this  system  can  be  introduced  only 
by  the  establishment  of  public  ownership  of  the  means  of 
production.  The  inevitable  solution  of  the  next  economic 
crisis  is  to  be  found  in  the  motto  of  this  magazine:  Let 
the  Nation  Own  the  Trusts. 


Undigested  Securities  125 


UNDIGESTED  SECURITIES 

(October,  1903.) 

THEEE  has  been  considerable  discussion  in  the  news- 
papers about  the  menace  to  our  industrial  situation  in 
the  unwillingness  or  inability  of  the  public  to  buy  a 
large  mass  of  securities,  bonds,  stocks,  etc.,  which  Mr.  Morgan 
and  his  associates  have  recently  issued  in  connection  with  the 
various  enterprises  incorporated  by  these  esteemed  gentlemen. 

In  order  to  understand  the  economic  position  clearly,  let 
us  suppose  that  there  are  but  three  capitalists  in  the  world, 
viz.:  Morgan,  Vanderbilt  and  Eockefeller,  and  that  these 
three  own  the  whole  earth.  They  look  over  the  map  and 
decide  that  certain  railroads,  canals  and  steel  works  shall  be 
built  to  give  better  facilities  for  the  production  of  material 
commodities.  Now  suppose  they  detail,  after  a  careful  calcu- 
lation, say,  two-thirds  of  the  inhabitants  of  the  earth  to  the 
work  of  manufacturing  the  food,  clothing,  housing,  etc., 
which  they  find  necessary  for  the  whole  of  the  inhabitants. 
And  suppose  they  divide  the  remaining  one-third  into  two 
parts,  detailing  one  part,  i.  e.,  one-sixth  of  the  whole,  to 
construct  and  establish  such  new  industries  as  they  think  are 
wanted,  and  the  other  one-sixth  to  producing  luxuries  for 
themselves  and  working  as  their  servants  or  retainers. 

This  is  practically  the  industrial  process  now  going  on. 
As  long  as  Vanderbilt,  Morgan  and  Eockefeller  can  keep  the 
whole  six-sixths  of  us  at  work,  there  is  no  danger  of  any 
unemployed  problem,  nor  will  there  be  any  trouble  about 
undigested  securities.  If  it  takes  two-thirds  of  the  earth's 
population  to  produce  wealth  enough  for  the  whole,  it  is 
evident  that  if  any  larger  part  than  the  remaining  one-third 
were  devoted  to  the  production  of  new  machinery  or 
luxuries,  then  the  excess  must  be  subtracted  from  the  two 
thirds ;  that  is,  from  the  number  necessary  to  feed  the  whole. 
In  other  words,  supposing  the  capitalists  were  so  eager  to 
build  new  railroads,  or  so  greedy  to  enjoy  luxuries,  that  they 


rd  A 


126  Socialism  Inevitable 

employed  more  than  one-third  at  such  occupations,  the  result 
would  be  a  diminution  in  the  amount  of  grain  and  pork  pro- 
duced, since  the  necessary  two-thirds  would  not  be  employed 
at  their  legitimate  work,  and  this  would  force  part  of  the 
world  to  go  hungry.  Such  would  be  the  condition  described 
in  the  economic  phrase,  "Too  much  floating  capital  has  become 
fixed  capital."  That  is,  we  would  be  building  railroads  more 
rapidly  than  we  could  afford  to. 

Now  supposing  that  Mr.  Vanderbilt  desired  to  build  more 
railroads  than  Mr.  Eockefeller  thought  the  world  could  afford, 
and  that  Mr.  Eockefeller,  therefore,  refused  to  join  him,  and 
should  say  to  Mr.  Vanderbilt:  "Look  here,  Vanderbilt,  you 
may  go  ahead  and  build  as  many  railroads  as  you  wish: 
I  will  lend  you  money  to  do  it  if  you  will  pledge  your  part 
of  the  world  to  me  as  security  for  your  payment/'  In  other 
words,  Mr.  Vanderbilt  assumes  the  risk  and  will  get  the 
profits  and  meet  the  losses,  while  Rockefeller  advances  the 
money  and  simply  gets  interest;  and  this  advance  of  money 
means  that  Rockefeller  allows  Vanderbilt  part  of  the  product 
of  his  laborers  to  feed  and  clothe  Vanderbilt's  laborers  while 
they  produce  more  railroads  for  him. 

If,  before  the  completion  of  the  railroad,  or  even  after  it, 
Rockefeller  should  demand  payment  from  Vanderbilt  of  what 
had  been  lent  to  him,  and  Vanderbilt  could  not  pay,  of  course 
Rockefeller  would  be  in  a  position  to  seize  Vanderbilt's  share 
of  the  earth,  that  is,  he  would  foreclose  his  mortgage.  Of 
course  if  Rockefeller  were  willing  to  wait,  Vanderbilt  might 
finally  pay  him  off,  but  it  might  be  that  conditions  would 
arise  that  would  force  Rockefeller  to  insist  upon  immediate 
payment,  and  then  Vanderbilt  would  be  in  a  bad  way.  By 
immediate  payment,  as  things  go  to-day,  we  mean  payment  in 
gold.  But  gold  is  obtained  from  the  laborer  who  mines  it 
by  the  exchange  of  other  commodities  produced  by  other 
laborers ;  so  that  Vanderbilt's  laborers  would  in  time  produce 
sufficient  food  to  feed  other  laborers  digging  out  gold,  and 
this  gold  would  first  go  into  Vanderbilt's  hands  and  thence 
to  Rockefeller  in  payment  of  the  debt.  All  this,  however, 
would  take  time,  and  time  might  be  the  element  most  im- 
portant in  the  case,  and  hence  most  vital  in  determining 
whether  Vanderbilt  could  liquidate  his  indebtedness  or  should 
lose  his  third  of  the  earth  by  foreclosure. 


Undigested  Securities  127 

Now  suppose  Vanderbilt  is  building  railroads  to-day,  that 
he  is  issuing  bonds  and  stocks  upon  these  railroads  which  are 
virtually  notes  of  indebtedness,  and  that  he  expects  to  sell 
these  stocks  and  bonds  to  Eockefeller.  If,  for  some  reason, 
Kockefeller  does  not  buy  with  the  avidity  that  he  might  be 
expected  to,  Vanderbilt  would  find  himself  with  a  lot  of 
"undigested  securities"  on  hand  which  he  could  not  dispose  of. 
In  the  course  of  time,  Vanderbilt  himself  might  take  them 
up  from  the  income  of  his  own  properties,  and  also  in  course 
of  time  Kockefeller  and  Morgan,  from  the  income  of  their 
properties,  might  have  a  surplus  on  hand  and  buy  such  secur- 
ities. All  this  again  is  but  a  question  of  time.  A  man  eats 
a  hearty  dinner :  if  he  is  in  a  healthy  condition  and  you  give 
him  time,  he  will  digest  it,  and  nothing  else  but  time  can 
effect  digestion.  And  so  it  is  with  the  problem  of  "undigested 
securities." 

Undigested  securities,  in  fact,  simply  mean  that  a  certain 
part  of  the  capitalists  have  overbuilt  the  machinery  of  pro- 
duction, and  that  their  bonds  and  securities,  issued  upon  this 
footing,  have  not  been  sold  to  other  capitalists  as  readily  as 
was  expected.  Unless  financial  disturbance  takes  place,  how- 
ever, this  condition  is  of  no  material  consequence,  inasmuch 
as  it  only  requires  time  to  straighten  matters  out,  that  is, 
provided  this  inordinate  construction  of  machinery  be  abated. 

Another  phrase  which  is  often  used  when  issuing  bonds  for 
the  payment  of  certain  improvements  is,  "We  will  let  posterity 
pay  for  this."  As  a  matter  of  fact,  any  work  that  is  being  done 
on  earth  to-day,  building  railroads  or  anything  else,  can  only 
be  done  by  the  present  generation;  and  it  is  absurd  to  talk 
of  a  generation  yet  unborn  performing  any  labor  for  us.  If 
bonds  are  issued  by  a  city  in  order  to  pay  for  its  sewer  system, 
it  simply  means  that  labor  is  being  performed  in  some  other 
part  of  the  world,  for  instance,  in  raising  wheat  and  pork,  and 
that  this  food  is  lent  by  the  capitalists  constructing  such 
improvements  to  the  citizens  of  that  town  to  feed  them  while 
they  are  completing  their  sewer,  upon  the  pledge  that  said 
wheat  and  pork  shall  be  paid  back  at  some  future  day  with  an 
added  percentage  in  the  way  of  interest.  Taking  the  earth 
as  a  whole,  however,  it  is  absurd  to  talk  about  posterity  con- 
structing any  present-day  improvements.     The  "posterity" 


128  Socialism  Inevitable 

that  works  for  us  is  the  present  generation  in  a  different 
locality. 

The  danger  that  we  face  to-day  lies,  not  in  these  undigested 
securities,  but  rather  in  our  capitalist  society  not  having 
enough  securities  furnished  to  feed  it.  Of  course  we  are  not 
unlike  the  individual  laborer  who  may  suffer  at  times  from 
indigestion  caused  by  eating  too  much,  though  his  great  danger 
will  not  be  in  overeating,  but  in  the  possibility  that  some 
day  he  may  not  have  enough  to  eat.  The  continuance  of  our 
capitalist  system  depends  upon  the  construction  of  more  and 
more  machinery,  and  this  machinery,  whether  it  be  a  new 
railroad  or  a  telegraph  cable,  is  represented  by  new  securities, 
— bonds  and  stocks;  but  when  the  world  reaches  the  point 
when  no  more  of  these  machines  are  needed,  there  will  be  no 
more  bonds  thrown  upon  the  market.  As  a  consequence  of 
this,  the  stock  market  will  suffer  from  a  scarcity  of  stocks 
rather  than  from  a  surplus,  with  the  immediate  result  of  a 
great  rise  in  price  of  existing  stocks  and  bonds,  unless,  which 
is  very  possible,  there  should  be  a  period  of  such  commercial 
depression,  owing  to  general  overproduction  and  the  reduced 
earnings  of  all  existing  stocks,  that  prices  fall  even  though  no 
more  stocks  should  be  issued. 

Now  the  moment  that  the  production  of  new  machinery 
ceases,  and  it  must  cease,  owing  to  the  practical  completion  of 
our  industrial  equipment,  we  will  be  confronted  with  a  great 
unemployed  problem.  But  while  this  may  appear  simulta- 
neously with  the  phenomenon  of  "undigested  securities,"  the 
only  reason  that  they  are  coincident  lies  in  the  fact  that  the 
securities  have  been  issued  upon  the  last  lot  of  machinery 
constructed,  which  has  failed  to  pay  dividends  owing  to  the 
lack  of  commercial  demand  for  such  machinery. 

Day  by  day  the  opportunities  are  lessening  for  the  invest- 
ment of  capital  in  enterprises  which  promise  safety  and  secur- 
ity. The  result  of  this  is  that  a  great  deal  of  machinery  is 
likely  to  be  manufactured  for  which  there  will  be  no  demand 
in  the  capitalistic  sense;  and  upon  this  machinery  stocks  and 
bonds  will  be  floated  which  in  many  instances  will  probably 
never  pay  dividends.  Such  securities  will  of  course  remain 
"undigested,"  for  they  are  in  the  nature  of  food  known  to  be 
innutritious  and  indigestible,  and  consequently  in  no  demand. 
In  the  continued  appearance  of  this  kind  of  securities,  there 


Undigested  Securities  129 

is  indeed  a  menace  to  our  whole  financial  structure;  and  it 
is  probable  that  many  of  the  securities  which  are  to-day  classed 
among  the  merely  "undigested"  will  prove  to  be  absolutely 
indigestible.  In  fact  the  recent  failure  of  the  Shipbuilding 
Trust,  and  of  several  other  great  corporations,  would  seem 
to  indicate  that  even  were  time  given,  the  public  will  be  very 
unlikely  to  take  over  such  securities,  inasmuch  as  there  appears 
to  be  very  little  likelihood  of  their  ever  paying  dividends. 

Thus  one  sees  that  the  cry  of  "undigested"  securities  is  of 
no  special  menace  if  the  securities  are  based  upon  legitimate 
financial  operations,  and  provided  we  have  time  to  allow  the 
public  gradually  to  absorb  them.  But  on  the  other  hand,  if 
they  represent  such  wildcat  concerns  as  the  Shipbuilding 
Trust,  they  are  a  menace  to  our  financial  system  and  a  prophecy 
of  its  early  collapse. 

It  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  the  financial  system  and  the 
industrial  system,  though  closely  related,  are  not  necessarily 
affected  by  the  same  conditions.  The  financial  systems  of  the 
world,  and  especially  those  of  the  United  States,  are  of  a  much 
more  delicate  nature  and  are  more  liable  to  derangement 
than  the  industrial  system.  The  latter  will  break  down  only 
when  we  reach  the  final  stage  of  complete  overproduction  of 
mechanical  equipment.  Our  financial  system,  on  the  other 
hand,  can  break  down  at  any  time  and  from  a  number  of 
causes,  and  it  is  very  likely  that  a  violent  financial  crisis  will 
be  precipitated  upon  us  some  years  ahead  of  the  inevitable  and 
final  industrial  crisis.  Of  course  it  is  understood  that  the 
one  will  lead  up  to  the  other.  Any  dav  might  see  some 
great  banking  institution  break,  which  will  pull  down  other 
banking  concerns,  and  throw  the  whole  financial  world  into 
a  state  of  collapse;  and  this  collapse  would  naturally  bring 
down  our  industrial  structure  in  the  common  ruin.  Hence 
we  may  not  have  to  wait  until  the  industrial  structure  is 
completed  until  we  shall  see  the  end  of  our  competitive  system. 

As  a  matter  of  fact  the  industrial  structure  is  already  in 
a  state  so  near  completion  that  any  great  financial  crisis  is 
likely  to  usher  in  the  transformation  of  society  from  Capital- 
ism to  Socialism. 


130  Socialism  Inevitable 


THE  SEQUEL  TO  A  MODERN    ROMANCE 

(November,  1903.) 

COMING  from  Venice  to  Vienna,  after  a  short  stay  in 
the  Austrian  Tyrol,  I  had  two  delightful  days  in 
Munich  with  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Serge  von  Shevitch. 

Fourteen  years  ago,  and  for  the  ten  preceding  years, 
Shevitch,  although  a  Eussian  by  birth,  was  the  leader  of  the 
American  Socialist  movement,  and  thereby  hangs  our  tale. 

The  year  1877  saw  him  in  the  United  States  for  the  first 
time — a  Russian  nobleman,  tall,  handsome  and  but  twenty- 
nine  years  of  age.  With  him  was  his  bride,  the  world-famous 
beauty,  Princess  Racowitz,  widow  of  the  Roumanian  Prince, 
the  woman  with  whom  the  great  Ferdinand  Lassalle  had  been 
so  passionately  in  love  and  on  whose  account  he  lost  his  life 
in  the  historic  duel. 

I  will  not  go  minutely  into  the  story  of  that  bit  of  romance 
in  the  development  of  Socialism :  it  has  already  been  too  fully 
exploited  to  bear  detailed  repetition.  In  brief,  however,  it 
is  as  follows:  Some  forty  years  ago  a  young  German,  Fer- 
dinand Lassalle,  the  most  gifted  philosopher,  orator  and 
politician  of  his  day,  organized  a  great  working-class  party  in 
Germany,  the  progenitor  of  the  existing  powerful  German 
Socialist  Party,  and  acquired  such  influence  that  even  the 
great  Bismarck,  then  at  the  height  of  his  power,  became 
terrified  and  made  him  the  most  tempting  offers  of  alliance. 

In  this  period  of  his  political  activity,  Lassalle  met  and  at 
once  fell  violently  in  love  with  the  brilliant  and  beautiful 
daughter  of  Count  Von  Donniges,  a  distinguished  member  of 
the  old  German  nobility,  and  Secretary  of  State  for  Bavaria. 
His  love  was  returned,  with  nothing  lost  in  wear  and  tear  by 
the  transfer,  and  it  looked  as  if  the  world's  dream  of  the  union 
of  her  greatest  man  to  her  most  beautiful  woman  was  at  last 
to  be  realized. 

The  lady's  practical  and  aristocratic  father,  however, 
dreamed,  differently  and  less  romantically,    A  title  and  wealth 


The  Sequel  To  A  Modern  Eomance  131 

were  in  his  mind,  and  he  saw  them  in  the  person  of  Prince 
Kacowitz,  who  had  long  been  a  persistent,  but  hitherto  un- 
successful, suitor  for  his  fair  daughter's  heart  and  hand.  The 
father  would  not  listen  to  the  idea  of  having  a  mere  Socialist 
agitator  for  a  son-in-law,  when  a  prince  could  be  had  for  the 
word. 

Now  before  1870  a  father's  power  over  his  daughter,  in 
Europe,  and  especially  in  Germany,  was  greater  than  nowa- 
days. The  count's  answer  to  Lassalle's  demand  and  his 
daughter's  lamentations  was  to  imprison  the  obdurate  maiden 
in  the  old  ancestral  castle.  One  night,  however,  after  several 
days  of  captivity,  she  eluded  the  guard  and  escaped.  Lassalle 
was  in  Switzerland.  She  flew  to  him  and  proposed  immediate 
marriage,  but  Lassalle's  pride  had  been  wounded  by  the  atti- 
tude taken  by  her  father,  and  he  said,  "No,  go  back  to  the 
castle.  I  will  not  take  you  by  stealth.  I  will  force  him  to 
give  you  to  me  in  an  open  and  conventional  manner,  as  a 
matter  of  justice  and  right." 

Of  course,  this  was  all  false  pride,  and,  consciously  or  un- 
consciously, must  have  wounded  the  girl's  sensibilities.  A  man 
doesn't  improve  his  position  at  such  a  time  by  bringing  in  the 
question  of  his  vanity.  When  the  lady  had  braved  all  and  fled 
to  him,  it  was  a  cruel  bit  of  weakness  and  conceit  to  cast  her 
back  on  her  father's  hands  on  the  chance  that  he  could  force 
his  consent. 

This  episode  naturally  enraged  the  old  count  more  than 
ever,  and  the  second  incarceration  of  his  daughter  was  much 
more  rigid  than  the  first,  while  his  remarks  regarding 
Lassalle  were  so  insulting  that  the  latter  could  do  nothing 
else  than  challenge  him  to  a  duel. 

Then,  as  the  father  was  too  old  and  feeble  to  fight,  Prince 
Kacowitz,  as  the  count's  choice  for  a  son-in-law,  stepped  to 
the  front  and  accepted  the  challenge.  Lassalle  consented  to 
the  change,  and,  as  challenger,  allowed  the  prince  to  name  the 
weapons.  Now  Lassalle  was  renowned  as  the  best  shot  and 
swordsman  in  Germany,  and  the  prince,  realizing  that  it  was 
practically  suicide  in  either  case,  chose  pistols. 

The  duel  came  off,  and  the  great  Lassalle  fell  mortally 
wounded  at  the  first  exchange  of  shots.  The  prince  was 
untouched. 

Then  after  many  bitter  scenes  with  her  old  father,  the 


132  Socialism  Inevitable 

lady's  spirit  was  conquered,  and  she  consented  to  marry  the 
prince.  But  after  another  two  years  the  prince  died  and  she 
was  left  a  widow.  And  this  is  where  all  the  other  narrators 
of  this  "Komance  of  the  Nineteenth  Century"  have  laid  down 
their  pens. 

I  will  now  give  the  Twentieth  Century  Sequel. 

Some  years  after  her  husband's  death  the  princess  went 
to  Paris,  where  she  soon  became  a  center  of  attraction,  owing 
to  her  beauty,  grace  and  accomplishments,  and  above  all,  to 
her  romantic  history,  which  the  Parisian  world  so  well  knew. 

Serge  Von  Shevitch,  a  rich  young  Kussian  nobleman,  was 
then  a  new  arrival  in  Paris,  the  handsomest  and  most  brilliant 
of  all  the  jeunesse  doree.  But  a  few  years  out  of  the  Univer- 
sity, where  he  and  Stepniak,  already  a  revolutionist,  and 
afterwards  well  known  as  a  Nihilist,  had  been  classmates, 
Shevitch  had  become  a  Socialist ;  and  this  at  once  put  him  on 
a  good  footing  with  the  old  sweetheart  of  Lassalle.  The 
courtship  was  ardent,  the  United  States  being  their  dream  of 
Utopia.  Marriage  ensued,  and  New  York  became  the  home 
of  the  young  couple. 

The  Socialist  Party  of  America  was  then  in  its  infancy. 
The  Volhszeitung,  the  German  Socialist  daily  of  New  York, 
had  just  been  launched,  and  was  struggling  in  a  very  stormy 
sea.  An  editor  was  badly  needed,  and  the  appearance  of 
Shevitch  seemed  to  the  Socialists  as  a  gift  sent  by  the  gods. 
He  soon  became  not  only  the  life  of  the  paper,  but  of  the 
whole  Socialist  movement  in  the  city;  and  thirty  years  ago 
New  York  spelled  America  for  Socialism. 

A  brilliant  writer  and  eloquent  orator,  of  commanding 
personal  appearance,  equally  at  home  in  the  German  and 
English  languages,  Shevitch  was  indeed  an  invaluable  ac- 
quisition to  the  Cause.  From  1879  to  1890  he  remained  editor 
of  the  Volkszeitung,  but  was  equally  famous  as  a  public 
speaker  and  debater.  Possibly  the  best  remembered  event, 
of  which  he  was  the  hero,  was  the  memorable  debate  in  Cooper 
Union,  when  he  so  completely  crushed  the  late  Henry  George, 
the  great  single  taxer.  Mrs.  Shevitch,  like  her  husband,  be- 
came a  notable  figure  in  New  York  and  is  still  remembered  by 
the  many  American  friends  she  gathered  about  her. 

In  1890,  much  to  the  consternation  and  sorrow  of  the  New 
York  Socialists,  the  Shevitches  returned  to  Kussia.      The 


The  Sequel  To  A  Modern  Romance  133 

change,  however,  was  imperative.  Shevitch  had  inherited 
large  estates,  and  the  Russian  law  provides  that  if  an  owner 
remains  absent  from  Russia  beyond  a  certain  fixed  period  of 
time,  his  lands  become  forfeited  to  the  crown.  After  living 
quietly  for  a  few  years  in  Russia  on  his  estate,  just  sufficient 
time,  in  fact,  to  allow  him  to  dispose  to  advantage  of  his  lands, 
Shevitch  and  his  wife  removed  to  Munich,  where  they  have 
been  living  ever  since,  and  where  I  had  the  pleasure  of  visiting 
them  the  other  day.  Shevitch  is  still  as  vigorous  and  hand- 
some as  ever,  though  he  is  now  fifty-five ;  while  Madam  She- 
vitch possesses  all  the  charm  which  rendered  her  so  irresist- 
ible in  years  gone  by.  They  live  delightfully  in  their  Munich 
home,  their  dinners  being  quite  the  best  I  have  had  in  Europe ; 
but  I  am  in  hopes  of  some  day  seeing  them  back  again  in 
America — if  not  permanently,  at  least  for  a  long  visit. 

Shevitch  is  taking  little  or  no  part  at  present  in  the  active 
movement.  The  German  government,  in  fact,  does  not  allow 
aliens  to  participate  in  politics,  and  as  they  have  at  the  same 
time  refused  him  naturalization  papers,  he  is  quite  cut  off 
from  active  participation  in  the  German  Socialist  movement. 

Shevitch  looks  forward  to  the  granting  of  a  constitution 
in  Russia  within  such  a  limited  number  of  years  that  he  him- 
self will  be  able  to  return  to  his  native  land  and  take  an 
active  part  in  the  rapidly  growing  movement  for  Socialism. 
He  says  that  practically  all  the  educated  men  in  Russia, 
outside  of  the  bureaucracy,  are  in  favor  of  a  constitution,  and 
that  the  pressure  is  becoming  too  great  for  the  autocracy  to 
resist  much  longer. 


134  Socialism  Inevitable 


WHITE  COLLARS  AND  A  YELLOW  PRESS 

(December,  1903.) 

TO  those  not  behind  the  scenes,  the  editorial  policy  of  the 
Hearst  papers  seems  absolutely  without  reason.  One 
day  they  favor  one  thing  and  the  next  day,  the  opposite. 
To-day  they  advocate  the  destruction  of  the  trusts  and  to- 
morrow, the  national  ownership  of  the  trusts.  All  of  which  is 
very  confusing. 

But  when  one  remembers  that  in  order  to  make  a  great 
paper  successful  it  is  necessary  to  have  the  backing  of  one  of 
the  principal  political  parties,  light  is  thrown  upon  the  mys- 
tery. Mr.  Hearst  is  shrewd  enough  to  know  that  the  current 
of  public  opinion  in  this  country  is  rapidly  setting  toward 
public  ownership,  not  only  of  municipal  utilities,  but  also  of 
railways  and  trusts.  He  also  knows  that  there  are  millions 
of  people  who  favor  this  without  in  the  least  realizing  that  it 
is  Socialistic,  or  that  it  tends  toward  Socialism.  He  would, 
therefore,  catch  this  class  of  ignorant  readers  for  his  news- 
papers, and  would  have  them  believe  that  he  is  the  chief  and 
only  exponent  of  such  views.  If  he  should  let  them  know  that 
the  platform  he  stands  on  in  this  particular  is  practically 
the  same  as  that  of  the  Socialists,  he  fears  not  only  the 
connection  of  his  name  with  Socialism,  but  also  the  likelihood 
that  he  would  receive  partial  credit  only  for  the  views  pre- 
sented in  his  editorial  columns. 

The  Socialist  Party  is  comparatively  small  and  obscure  as 
yet,  and  for  Hearst  to  wind  up  his  Socialist  editorials  by 
advising  his  readers  to  vote  the  Socialist  ticket,  would  un- 
doubtedly alienate  a  good  many  of  his  Democratic  followers, 
and  would  be  entirely  inconsistent  with  his  ambition  to  be 
the  next  Democratic  nominee  for  President.  It  is  clear, 
therefore,  that  Hearst  is  perfectly  logical  in  his  apparently 
illogical  course  of  glorifying  Socialism  in  the  abstract,  but 
damning  the  Socialists  who  propose  to  put  the  system  in 
practice. 

The  following  editorial  taken  from  the  New  York  Journal, 
of  September  18th,  is  a  striking  corroboration  of  the  foregoing : 


White  Collars  And  A  Yellow  Press  135 

The  Social  Democratic  Party  in  Germany  is  a  powerful  and 
splendid  proof  of  German  courage  and  independence. 

In  the  face  of  government  oppression,  in  the  face  of  military 
oppression,  in  the  face  of  aristocratic  pretensions  and  snubs  and 
sneers,  in  the  face  of  clerical  oppression — the  Social  Democrats 
of  Germany  have  built  themselves  into  the  greatest  political 
party  in  the  land,  three  millions  of  earnest,  unselfish,  thinking 
men.  This  great  body  of  the  actual  common  people  can  be  looked 
upon  only  with  respect  and  reverence  here  in  America,  where 
all  our  sympathies  must  be  with  the  class  that  fights  imperialism. 

The  leading  Social  Democrats  of  Germany  are  great  men  and 
educated  men.  Herr  Bebel,  Herr  von  Vollmar  and  the  other 
leaders  are  men  of  unselfish  devotion,  and  at  the  same  time  of 
earnest  thought  and  thorough  education. 

The  future  of  Germany  is  in  their  hands.  They  will  solve  the 
military  and  all  other  German  questions.  In  the  meantime  the 
army,  pride  of  the  Emperor's  heart,  is  manufacturing  Social 
Democrats  every  day,  catching  the  peasant  boy,  awkward  and 
ungainly,  in  his  country  village,  kicking  him  and  cuffing  him 
simultaneously  into  a  trained  soldier  and  a  Social  Democrat 
who  hates  the  laws  that  cuffed  him. 

We  wish  to-day  to  speak  of  the  statement  made  by  an  Ameri- 
can Socialist  at  the  Germans'  Socialistic  Congress  at  Dresden. 

This  individual,  alleged  to  represent  the  United  States  Social- 
ists, declared  that  a  Socialistic  crisis  would  come  first  in  America, 
that  the  development  of  the  trusts  would  bring  about  Socialism  in 
this  country. 

We  cannot  express  for  the  American  Socialist  Party  the  same 
admiration  as  we  feel  for  the  Social  Democrats  of  Germany. 

The  German  Social  Democrat  is  a  serious,  earnest  man,  pro- 
testing against  imperialism,  militarism,  special  privileges  for  the 
noble,  special  oppressions  for  the  people. 

What  he  asks  for,  any  decent  American  citizen  would  ask  for, 
if  he  lived  in  Germany. 

The  American  Socialist  is,  with  honorable  exceptions,  not  to 
be  classed  with  the  Social  Democrat  of  Germany. 

He  is  a  man  who  often  expresses  a  social  dissatisfaction  based 
upon  personal  failure.  He  is  very  apt  to  be  loud  rather  than 
profound.  He  is  as  a  rule  not  an  educated  man,  and  his  de- 
mands and  urgings  are  based  too  often  on  ignorance. 

The  statement  that  the  trusts  in  the  United  States  will  bring 
about  Socialism  in  the  United  States  is  ignorant;  it  shows  a 
lack  of  understanding  of  to-day's  problems. 

Socialism  properly  understood  ought  to  mean  the  betterment 
of  social  conditions. 

If  Socialism  be  defined  as  the  improvement  of  social  condi- 
tions, then,  of  course,  every  good  citizen  is  a  Socialist.  For 
every  good  citizen  knows  that  social  conditions  ought  to  be 
better. 

Admitting  such  a  definition  of  Socialism,  it  may  truthfully  be 


136  Socialism  Inevitable 

aaid  that  the  trusts  will  bring  about  Socialism;  that  is  to  say, 
better  social  conditions. 

We  believe  that  industry  among  human  beings  is  destined  to 
pass  through  three  phases— the  phases  of  competition,  of  organ- 
ization, of  emulation. 

Civilization  has  spent  thousands  of  years  in  the  competitive 
system.  Out  of  a  hundred  business  men,  ninety-nine  have 
failed — one  hundred  business  enterprises  have  landed  ninety- 
nine  men  with  broken  hearts,  broken  hopes,  and  one  man 
with  money  in  his  pocket  and  a  broken  digestion. 

Competition  encouraged  the  merchant  to  sell  adulterated  goods, 
bogus  goods,  worthless  goods.  It  encouraged  him  to  pay  his 
employees  as  little  as  he  could  in  order  to  compete  with  others 
who  hired  employees,  and  to  charge  his  customers  as  much  as 
he  could. 

The  competitive  system  is  now  dying  a  slow  death. 

Already  the  system  of  organization  has  arrived  and  the  trusts 
represent  this  system. 

It  is  crude  and  selfish,  it  takes  for  a  few  big  organized  pirates 
the  enormous  sums  that  used  to  be  distributed  among  a  great 
many  little  competitive  pirates. 

But  organization,  even  under  trust  management,  is  a  step  in 
the  right  direction. 

The  trust  that  is  combining  the  nation's  industries  into  a  few 
companies  paves  the  way  certainly  and  surely  for  national  owner- 
ship. 

When  one  man,  or  half  a  dozen  men,  shall  own  all  the  rail- 
roads of  the  United  States  there  will  be  interference  by  the 
people  sooner  or  later.  When  one  man,  or  a  few  men,  shall  own 
all  the  steel  mills,  all  the  coal  mines  and  the  oil  wells,  all  the 
street-car  lines — there  will  be  interference  by  the  people  sooner  or 
later. 

When  it  is  clearly  proved  that  one  man,  or  a  few  men,  can  run 
the  business  of  a  nation,  that  the  much  vaunted  competition  is 
not  the  life  of  trade  but  an  indication  of  savagery,  then  the 
people  will  say  to  the  one  man,  or  the  few  men,  "We,  the  people, 
will  own  the  business  of  the  people,  and  not  you,  an  individual." 

In  pursuance  of  his  policy  not  to  mention  the  names  of 
Socialists  more  than  is  absolutely  necessary,  it  will  be  noticed 
that  Hearst  alludes  to  the  editor  of  this  paper,  who  happened 
to  be  the  American  delegate  at  the  convention  referred  to, 
as  "this  individual."  In  the  cablegram  from  Germany,  how- 
ever, upon  which  the  editorial  was  based,  and  which  appeared 
in  another  column  of  the  same  issue,  he  was  forced  to  allow 
the  name  of  Wilshire  to  appear. 

Mr.  Hearst  says  that  the  American  Socialists  are  not  good 
enough  to  be  classed  with  the  Socialists  of  Germany;  neverthe- 


White  Collars  And  A  Yellow  Press  137 

less,  the  fact  remains  that  the  latter  receive  their  American 
comrades  as  brothers,  and  are  only  too  glad  to  have  us  at 
their  conventions,  and  to  extend  to  us  all  the  courtesies  cus- 
tomary to  the  members  of  the  same  party. 

Pursuing  his  general  policy  of  misrepresentation,  Hearst 
naturally  meets  with  the  difficulty  encountered  by  all  imagina- 
tive writers,  of  making  his  stories  agree  at  every  point.  It 
will  be  seen  that  the  editorial  starts  out  by  saying  that 
"the  statement  that  the  trusts  in  the  United  States  will 
bring  about  Socialism  in  the  United  States  is  ignorant,  and 
shows  lack  of  understanding  of  to-day's  problems."  This  is 
followed,  a  little  later  on,  by  a  statement  of  his  own  that 
"the  Trust  that  is  combining  the  nation's  industries  into  a 
few  companies,  is  paving  the  way  certainly  and  surely  for 
national  ownership.  .  .  .  When  one  man  or  a  few  men  shall 
own  all  the  steel  mills,  all  the  coal  mines,  all  the  oil  wells 
and  all  the  street-car  lines,  there  will  be  interference  by  the 
people  sooner  or  later.  When  it  is  clearly  proved  that  one 
man,  or  a  few  men,  can  run  the  business  of  the  nation.  .  .  . 
then  the  people  will  say  to  the  one  man,  or  the  few  men, 
"We,  the  people,  will  own  the  business  of  the  people,  and  not 
you,  an  individual." 

The  distinction,  in  Mr.  Hearst's  mind,  between  the  two 
statements  seems  to  be  that  one  is  made  by  a  member  of  the 
Socialist  Party  and  the  other  is  not.  When  "this  individual" 
says  that  the  trusts  are  paving  the  way  for  Socialism  it  is 
"ignorant,"  but  when  Hearst  makes  the  statement  himself  it 
is  the  quintessence  of  wisdom. 

Again,  he  says  that  the  Socialists  are  men  who  have  failed 
in  life,  and  who  neglect  to  wash  their  hands  or  wear  clean 
collars. 

Granting  this  to  be  true  it  would  not  invalidate  the  argu- 
ments of  Socialism.  A  great  many  men  in  the  world's  history, 
who  have  not  been  noted  for  clean  collars,  have  given  to  the 
world  the  profoundest  truths.  We  do  not  judge  of  Truth  by 
the  source  from  which  it  comes.  Truth  speaks  for  itself. 
Mr.  Hearst  may  congratulate  himself  that  we  have  passed 
the  stage  where  the  truth  of  a  man's  statement  is  determined 
either  by  the  whiteness  of  his  collar  or  the  yellowness  of  his 
journal. 


138  Socialism  Inevitable 


THE  SIPPERS  OF  CARLSBAD 

(December,  1905.) 

TOO  much  eating  and  too  little  exercise  does  not  fall  to  the 
lot  of  everyone  in  Austria.  The  standard  of  wages  is 
not  conducive  to  the  laying  up  of  too  much  adipose  tis- 
sue on  the  bones  of  the  ordinary  laborer,  nor  has  he  such  short 
hours  of  work  that  he  fails  to  get  enough  daily  exercise.  How- 
ever true  all  this  may  be,  there  are,  out  of  the  forty  million 
people  in  the  Austrian  Empire,  a  good  many  thousands  who 
are  unlucky  enough  not  to  belong  to  the  wage-earning 
class;  consequently  many  of  them  are  forced  to  seek  an 
alternative  to  hard  work  and  plain  living  in  taking  "die  Kur" 
at  Carlsbad. 

There  are  about  fifty  thousand  visitors  to  the  springs  each 
year,  and  while  all  the  world  contributes  its  quota,  the  great 
bulk  of  the  visitors — four-fifths — are  Germans  and  Austrians. 
There  are  about  one  thousand  Englishmen  and  a  little  over 
two  thousand  Americans.  The  season  opens  in  May,  is  at  its 
height  about  the  20th  of  July,  when  12,000  are  here,  and 
closes  in  October.  The  water  is  just  as  good  in  winter  and 
quite  as  hot,  for  the  Sprudel  Spring  has  a  constant  tempera- 
ture of  163  degrees  Fahrenheit,  but  man  does  not  live  by 
bread  alone,  and  neither  is  he  cured  solely  by  Carlsbad  water. 
How  much  of  the  cure  comes  from  the  water,  indeed,  and  how 
much  from  the  regimen  will  ever  remain  a  vexed  question. 

The  cure  consists  in  getting  up  at  six  in  the  morning, 
walking  down  to  one  of  the  various  springs,  dipping  up  a 
cup  of  water,  and  slowly  drinking  it  by  sips,  until  four  or 
five  cups  are  swallowed.  This  should  take,  say,  half  an  hour, 
during  which  you  are  parading  up  and  down  a  fine  covered 
colonnade,  with  thousands  of  other  drinkers,  each  holding  his 
cup  in  hand,  and  taking  an  occasional  sip.  Meanwhile,  the 
Carlsbad  Band  plays  most  delightful  music  for  you  and  the 
other  peripatetic  sippers. 

When  the  water  is  all  down  you  continue  to  walk  for  one 


The  Sippers  Of  Carlsbad  139 

hour  and  then  have  a  light  breakfast,  without  sweets  or  coffee. 
At  two,  you  dine,  then  take  another  walk,  and  at  seven  you 
sup  lightly,  and  after  still  another  walk  go  to  bed.  The  water 
is  taken  only  once  a  day,  in  the  morning.  The  cure  takes  at 
least  four  weeks  and  preferably  six. 

Carlsbad  is  in  itself  a  delightful  resort,  with  beautiful 
shady  walks  and  excellent  hotels,  having  accommodations 
suited  to  all  kinds  of  purses.  For,  while  the  rich  are  much 
in  evidence,  it  would  be  unfair  not  to  state  that  at  least 
half,  if  not  more,  are  invalids  who  are  far  from  rich.  In 
fact,  it  is  quite  probable  that  poor  food  and  over-work  have 
driven  just  as  many  to  Carlsbad  as  have  rich  food  and  no 
work.  Indeed,  the  trouble  with  modern  life  is  that  it  is 
all  extremes,  with  no  happy  medium.  A  man  is  ill  either 
from  too  much  work  or  from  too  little. 

Carlsbad  is  a  good  example  of  the  possibilities  of  municipal 
Socialism.  The  city  owns  the  springs,  the  gas  and  electric 
lights,  the  magnificent  bath  house,  and  one  of  the  most  beau- 
tiful and  best  arranged  theatres  in  the  world.  Nevertheless, 
the  wages  paid  employees  by  the  city  are  no  better,  nor  are 
the  hours  any  shorter,  than  those  obtaining  under  private 
employers. 

Passing  through  Belgium,  I  asked  the  guard  upon  the 
Belgian  National  Railway  about  his  wages,  and  conditions 
of  work.  He  said  that  he  was  now  getting  $216  a  year;  that 
he  had  started  in  at  $180 ;  that  at  the  end  of  forty  years'  ser- 
vice he  would  be  getting  $510,  and  could  then  retire  upon  a 
pension  of  $360  a  year. 

He  paid  $12  for  his  uniform,  which  lasted  two  years,  and 
for  his  board  and  lodging,  $11  per  month.  He  was  liable  to 
thirteen  hours'  work  a  day,  seven  days  in  the  week;  but  said 
that  the  actual  hours  of  work  did  not  average  more  than 
ten.  He  was  a  bright,  intelligent  young  fellow  of  twenty- 
three,  and  seemed  quite  content ;  so  much  so  that  he  was  not  a 
Socialist  and  took  no  interest  in  the  subject. 


140  Socialism  Inevitable 


MONOPOLY  A  NECESSITY 

(January,   1904.) 

THE  series  of  interesting  articles  upon  Mr.  Rockefeller  is 
still  running  in  McClwe's  Magazine.  The  author 
is  Miss  Tarbell,  and  her  story  certainly  shows  great 
ability  in  the  gathering  and  arrangement  of  the  data.  It 
would  seem,  however,  that  if  she  once  grasped  the  fact  that 
Mr.  Rockefeller  was  forced  by  unavoidable  circumstances  to 
pursue  his  path  of  consolidation,  she  would  write  a  more 
sympathetic  article  and  one  in  which  the  philosophy  would 
be  more  apparent.  No  causality  enters  into  her  story,  nor 
does  she  correlate  her  facts,  as  she  might  easily  do,  by  making 
the  predominating  note  the  necessity  of  things. 

If  a  leak  be  found  in  a  Mississippi  River  levee  it  demands 
instant  attention,  for  every  drop  of  water  that  goes  through 
increases  the  opening,  until  finally  the  crevice  becomes  so  great 
that  nothing  can  prevent  the  ruin  of  the  fertile  fields  that  lie 
beyond.  No  sacrifice  is  too  great  for  the  planters  to  make 
to  prevent  such  a  leak,  and  nothing  is  considered  a  greater 
crime  than  to  weaken  the  levee.  Indeed,  during  periods  of 
flood,  patrols  walk  up  and  down  armed  with  rifles,  to  shoot 
down  any  pilot  who  runs  his  steamboat  so  near  to  the  levee 
that  the  wash  from  the  boat  might  damage  it. 

Competition  in  a  business,  like  the  production  and  refining 
of  oil,  or,  in  fact,  any  business  furnishing  a  commodity  of 
which  price  is  a  determining  factor  in  finding  a  market,  is 
just  as  dangerous  to  the  stability  of  that  business  as  a  break 
in  the  levee  is  to  a  plantation  on  the  banks  of  the  Mississippi. 
If  competition  is  not  stopped  at  once,  it  grows  worse  and 
worse,  until  finally  the  business  is  swamped. 

For  instance,  here  is  Mr.  Rockefeller  with  a  monopoly  of 
the  oil  business.  A  small  refiner,  say,  like  Mr.  George  Rice, 
of  Marietta,  competes  with  him.  Mr.  Rice,  in  order  to  sell  his 
oil,  sells  it  at  a  little  lower  price  than  Mr.  Rockefeller  sells 
his.    Mr.  Rockefeller,  however,  continues  to  hold  up  the  price, 


Monopoly  A  Necessity  141 

so  that  Mr.  Rice  is  enabled  to  make  money,  even  if  he  must 
take  a  cent  a  gallon  less  than  Mr.  Rockefeller.  Then  Mr. 
Rice  uses  the  profits  that  he  so  makes  in  enlarging  his  re- 
finery, and  next  month  is  able  to  sell  still  more  oil ;  whereupon 
he  again  uses  the  profits  for  still  further  enlargements.  Mean- 
while, it  must  be  understood  that  Mr.  Rockefeller  has  more 
than  enough  refineries  to  supply  the  market,  and  sees  some 
of  them  standing  idle  because  he  has  closed  them  to  prevent 
the  lowering  of  price  by  the  production  of  too  much  oil.  That 
is,  Rockefeller  holds  up  the  umbrella  to  protect  Rice,  or,  ixi 
other  words,  benefits  his  rival  by  limiting  production.  Now 
what  would  happen  if  Mr.  Rockefeller  allowed  this  thing  to 
go  on  ?  Mr.  Rice  would  finally  have  just  as  large  a  plant  as 
Mr.  Rockefeller,  the  market  would  soon  be  flooded,  and  both 
would  go  down  in  a  common  sea  of  bankruptcy  through  the 
ruinous  prices  resulting  from  this  overproduction. 

We  justify  a  man  going  to  any  extreme  to  preserve  his  own 
life  and  that  of  his  family.  Self-preservation  is  the  first  lw 
of  nature.  A  man's  business  is  his  support  in  life,  and  if  you 
take  that  away  you  take  away  his  life  as  well.  It  may  seem 
absurd  to  talk  about  such  a  small  competitor  as  Mr.  Rice 
taking  away  the  life  of  the  Standard  Oil  Trust;  but  a  little 
mole  may  start  a  hole  in  the  levee  which  will  develop  into 
a  crevasse  allowing  the  Mississippi  to  sweep  away  a  whole 
county.  Hence,  when  we  hear  tales  of  the  Standard  Oil 
Trust  having  gone  to  the  utmost  extreme  in  order  to  extermi- 
nate competitors,  even  to  blowing  up  their  oil  refineries  with 
dynamite,  we  need  not  be  astonished  at  the  heroic  measures 
employed.  It  is  simply  a  question  of  self-preservation.  When 
the  trades  unions  resort  to  every  possible  means,  legal  or 
illegal,  to  prevent  even  one  "scab"  doing  work  in  competition 
with  the  union,  they  are  pursuing  exactly  the  same  policy. 
They  know  that  if  one  scab  is  allowed  to  work,  more  scabs 
will  come  in,  and  finally  there  will  be  enough  at  work  to 
break  up  the  union.  The  number  of  non-union  men  employed 
in  a  shop  may  be  insignificant  as  compared  with  the  number 
of  union  men,  but  it  presents  just  the  same  kind  of  danger 
that  Mr.  Rice's  small  capital  against  the  enormous  capital  of 
the  Standard  Oil  Company  does,  if  allowed  to  exist  in  com- 
petition with  it. 

This  necessity  for  the  extermination  of  competitors  in  the 


142  Socialism  Inevitable 

capitalistic  world  is  going  to  be  brought  very  clearly  before  us 
during  the  next  year,  when  profits  and  interest  approach  the 
vanishing  point,  co-incident  with  the  disappearance  of  pros- 
perity. The  necessity  for  monopoly  is  going  to  be  infinitely 
more  apparent  in  the  near  future  than  it  has  ever  been  in  the 
past.  This  will  apply  to  the  trades  unionists  as  well  as  to  the 
capitalists,  and  all  possible  means  to  secure  it  will  probably 
be  used  by  both  sides. 


Mr.  Gompees  And  His  Little  Plan  143 


MR.  GOMPERS  AND  HIS  LITTLE  PLAN 

(January,  1904.) 

THE  American  Federation  of  Labor,  by  a  vote  of  more 
than  five  to  one,  has  decided  that  it  doesn't  want  any 
close  connection  between  the  political  and  the  economic 
movements  of  the  working  class. 

Mr.  Gompers,  the  president  of  the  Federation,  took  occa- 
sion during  the  debate  on  the  subject  to  declare  to  the  Social- 
ists :  "Economically  you  are  unsound,  socially  you  are  wrong, 
and  industrially  you  are  an  impossibility/'  Such  remarks 
from  Mr.  Gompers  naturally  aroused  more  or  less  annoyance 
not  only  among  the  Socialist  delegates  at  the  convention, 
but  also  among  Socialists  generally  throughout  the  country. 

But  what  else  could  we  expect?  Mr.  Gompers  spoke  from 
his  own  particular  trade  union  standpoint,  and  trade  union- 
ism is  essentially  a  movement  to  raise  wages.  That  this  is  a 
difficult  task  goes  without  saying.  It  is  difficult  enough 
when  the  whole  attention  of  organized  labor  is  devoted 
to  this  one  object,  and  dividing  the  attention  certainly 
would  not  make  the  task  any  lighter.  Such  is  the  position 
taken  by  Mr.  Gompers  and  Mr.  Mitchell  and  the  rest  of  the 
trade  unionists  pure  and  simple,  and  I  do  not  deny  that 
there  is  more  or  less  logic  in  it. 

Neither  Mr.  Gompers  nor  Mr.  Mitchell,  however,  under- 
stands the  present  economic  situation  and  its  natural  evolu- 
tion. They  look  upon  Socialism  as  if  it  were  a  scheme  of 
industrial  government  to  be  imposed  upon  us  by  the  con- 
scious action  of  the  working  class,  along  the  line  of  a  pre- 
determined plan.  That  it  is  coming  about  as  the  natural  and 
inevitable  result  of  industrial  and  social  evolution  has  never 
even  occurred  to  them. 

The  Socialist  Party  at  the  last  election  cast  a  very  small 
percentage  of  the  general  vote.  If  Gompers  should  advise 
trade  unionists  to  attach  themselves  to  this  small  party, 
he  knows  enough  to  know  that  he  would  influence  only  a 


144  Socialism  Inevitable 

small  percentage  of  the  trade  -unionists,  and  that  little  good 
could  accrue  to  the  Socialist  movement,  while  much  harm 
might  result  to  the  trade  unions. 

He  also  knows  that  such  advocacy  would  cost  him  his 
office.  Many  of  the  trade  unionists  are  good  Democrats  or 
good  Republicans,  as  the  case  may  be,  and  have  as  much 
affection  for  their  respective  parties  as  a  Methodist  has  for 
his  church.  Some,  indeed,  would  rather  abandon  their  union 
than  their  party.  To  ask  a  Eepublican  trade  unionist  to 
attach  himself  to  the  Socialist  Party  would  be  almost  like 
asking  a  Methodist  to  become  a  Roman  Catholic.  It  takes  a 
long  process  of  education  to  make  a  Socialist,  and  particularly 
is  this  true  when  the  man  has  been  doing  as  well  as  has  the 
average  trade  unionist  for  the  last  four  or  five  years.  He 
is  quite  satisfied  with  the  existing  system  which  has  given 
him  a  steady  job,  and  though  he  asks  for  more  if  he  thinks 
he  can  get  it,  often  in  his  inmost  heart  he  thinks  he  is  get- 
ting all  that  is  his  due. 

The  knowledge  that  he  produces  a  great  deal  more  than  the 
very  best  paid  tTade  unionist  receives,  and  the  conviction 
that  he  should  get  the  whole  of  his  product,  is  not  as  yet 
widely  prevalent  among  the  trade  unionists.  Nevertheless, 
President  Gompers  himself  admitted  that  conditions  for  the 
next  year  are  not  going  to  be  analogous  to  those  of  the  past 
four  years.  He  knows  that  we  are  approaching  a  period  of 
great  depression,  and  has  warned  the  capitalists  that  they 
ought  not  to  meet  this  by  reducing  wages.  He  has,  in  fact, 
adopted  the  Socialist  argument,  that  inasmuch  as  the  work- 
ing class  constitutes  the  great  bulk  of  consumers,  any  reduc- 
tion in  wages  will  reduce  the  demand  for  commodities  to 
just  the  extent  of  that  reduction,  and  render  the  problem 
of  overproduction  still  more  insoluble. 

The  idea  of  Gompers  appealing  to  the  capitalists  to  keep 
up  wages  in  a  time  of  falling  prices  and  overproduction  is 
a  more  palpably  Utopian  scheme  than  anything  the  Social- 
ists ever  dreamed  of  presenting.  For  instance,  here,  say,  are 
the  cotton  mills  encountering  a  reduction  in  the  price  of 
cotton  cloth.  They  have  as  alternatives,  either  to  shut  down 
the  mills  altogether  or  to  reduce  wages  so  as  to  decrease  the 
cost  of  the  cloth,  and  enable  them  to  make  and  sell  their 
product   without   loss.     According  to    Gompers'   plan   they 


Mr.  Gompers  And  His  Little  Plan  145 

would  go  ahead  paying  the  same  wages  as  at  present,  in 
order  to  give  the  mill  workers  an  opportunity  of  buying  more 
cloth  than  they  could  if  wages  were  reduced.  If  the  cotton 
mill  owners  were  the  only  employers  of  labor  in  the  world, 
this  plan  might  work  well  enough;  but  inasmuch  as  they 
are  engaged  in  competition  with  all  the  rest  of  the  world,  and 
as  the  laborers  spend  but  a  very  small  proportion  of  their 
wages  in  buying  cotton  cloth,  and  the  far  greater  proportion 
in  buying  bread  and  meat  and  sugar  and  paying  rent,  it  can 
be  seen  that  the  cotton  mill  owners  personally  would  get  a 
very  small  direct  benefit  through  keeping  up  wages  in  the 
cotton  mills. 

The  plan  is  self-evidently  an  impossibility.  With  the 
period  of  depression  and  falling  prices  that  we  are  now  enter- 
ing upon  in  the  United  States,  the  capitalists  must  either 
reduce  wages  or  shut  down  the  factories.  Even  the  reduction 
of  wages  will  be  at  best  only  a  temporary  expedient,  how- 
ever, and  we  will  finally  have  to  shut  down  the  factories 
anyway.  Gompers,  therefore,  is  right  in  saying  that  the 
working  class  constitutes  the  bulk  of  the  consumers,  and 
that  cutting  down  their  wages  will  hasten  the  coming  of  the 
unemployed  problem;  but  in  the  meantime  cutting  down  the 
wages  does  give  the  capitalist  a  chance  to  breathe  a  little 
longer,  and  the  meantime  is  very  important. 

When  the  Federation  of  Labor  meets  next  year  conditions 
are  going  to  be  very  different.  There  will  be  no  mutual 
congratulations  about  the  prosperity  of  trade  unionism,  in- 
crease of  wages  and  winning  of  strikes;  but  on  the  contrary 
a  very  mournful  tale  will  be  told  of  the  breaking  up  of  the 
unions,  a  large  decrease  in  the  membership  of  the  Federation, 
a  great  reduction  of  wages  and  hundreds  of  thousands  of 
members  out  of  employment.  Gompers'  absurd  plan  of  having 
the  capitalists  pay  high  wages  during  periods  of  depression 
will  not  even  be  mentioned. 

The  question  as  to  whether  Socialism  is  an  industrial  im- 
possibility, as  Mr.  Gompers  has  proclaimed,  will  probably 
be  the  particular  subject  of  discussion.  Certainly  the  existing 
system  of  competition  will  have  proved  itself  to  be  an  im- 
possibility and  will  be  so  realized  by  a  great  many  out-of- 
work  trade  unionists.  For  when  a  man  is  out  of  employment 
he  is  very  apt  to  have  his  ideas  shaken  as  to  the  eternal 


146  Socialism  Inevitable 

goodness  of  the  existing  system,  even  if  he  does  adore  Mr. 
Gompers.  Hence,  with  competition  found  to  be  impossible, 
and  Socialism  declared  by  Gompers  to  be  impracticable,  the 
trade  unionist  will  indeed  be  in  a  perplexed  state  of  mind. 
Whatever  way  he  may  look  he  will  see  no  land  in  sight. 
However,  with  the  collapse  of  the  present  wage  system,  it 
is  probable  that  the  deference  he  now  shows  to  Mr.  Gompers' 
view  of  Socialism  may  be  considerably  modified. 

Yet  so  long  as  we  can  get  along  at  all  with  the  present 
system,  no  change  will  be  made.  Man,  as  a  rule,  is  loath 
to  do  anything  until  he  has  to,  and  naturally  when  it  comes 
to  making  such  a  vast  change  as  that  from  one  social  system 
to  another,  he  is  not  likely  to  act  until  it  has  become  a  vital 
necessity.  But  this  is  the  point,  it  seems  to  me,  which  is 
likely  to  be  reached  before  a  great  many  years. 

Trade  unions  are  of  benefit  to  the  laborer  only  when  there 
is  a  demand  for  labor,  just  as  the  Trust  is  of  benefit  to  the 
capitalist  only  when  there  is  a  demand  for  capital.  The 
trade  union  prevents  competition  among  laborers  cutting 
the  price  of  labor  below  the  point  of  subsistence,  just  as  the 
Trust  prevents  capitalists  selling  their  capital  below  cost. 
In  both  cases  the  premise  is  that  there  is  a  demand.  If  there 
is  no  demand  for  labor,  the  trade  unions  naturally  cannot 
protect  the  laborer.  On  the  other  hand,  when  there  is  no 
demand  for  capital  for  the  production  of  commodities  be- 
cause of  a  "glutted  market,"  there  is  no  reason  why  there 
should  be  any  Trust  among  capitalists  to  prevent  too  much 
capital  going  into  that  industry. 

The  crisis  just  now  impending  in  this  country  cannot  be 
averted  by  the  action  of  either  of  the  trade  unions  or  the 
trusts.  They  are  equally  helpless  before  the  situation  which 
arises  from  non-demand  for  their  respective  commodities. 

Some  people  have  argued  that  the  trusts,  by  regulating  the 
production  of  commodities,  can  institute  some  sort  of  in- 
dustrial feudalism  which  will  result  in  the  permanence  of 
the  existing  competitive  system.  There  is  no  doubt  at  all  that 
the  existing  trusts,  by  virtue  of  their  monopoly,  have  been 
able  to  make  much  greater  profits  than  they  would  have 
made  under  competition,  and  to  a  certain  very  limited  extent 
they  have  divided  these  profits  among  their  respective  em- 
ployees by  the  payment  of  somewhat  higher  wages.     This 


Mr.  Gompers  And  His  Little  Plan  147 

sop,  though  small,  had  something  to  do  with  the  Federation's 
declaration  against  anti-Trust  legislation,  in  which  it  was 
set  forth  that  such  legislation  would  be  turned  against  the 
trade  unions  rather  than  against  the  capitalists.  And  although 
there  is  some  truth  in  this  allegation,  it  is  also  true  that  the 
trade  unions  themselves  feel  so  lewhat  kindly  toward  the 
Trust  form  of  industry,  which  has  enabled  them  to  get 
higher  wages  than  could  possibly  have  fallen  to  them  other- 
wise. The  employer  when  he  reduces  wages  invariably  ex- 
cuses himself  to  his  workmen  by  declaring  that  he  is  re- 
luctantly forced  to  it  by  the  lowering  of  prices.  The  Trust, 
by  being  the  only  employer,  might  oppress  labor,  but  so  far 
it  has  not  exercised  its  power  that  way,  and  trade  unionists 
are  apparently  grateful  for  the  favor  they  have  received. 
The  adoption  of  these  resolutions  by  the  Federation  of  Labor 
is  more  or  less  tangible  evidence  of  this  fact. 

Furthermore,  the  recent  disclosures  ventilated  in  McClures 
Magazine  about  the  combination  of  the  trade  unionists  and 
the  Trust  of  the  Coal  Dealers  in  Chicago,  by  which  the 
latter  raised  the  price  of  coal,  and  then,  through  their  tre- 
mendous profits,  were  enabled  to  pay  higher  prices  for  union 
labor,  is  still  fresh  in  our  memories,  and  is  a  concrete  example 
of  what  Mr.  Gompers  is  grateful  for.  With  a  constantly 
growing  demand  for  commodities  the  Trust  could  hold  a 
monopoly  price  upon  sales,  and  if  they  were  entrenched  still 
further  in  their  monopoly  by  an  alliance  with  the  trade 
unions,  and  in  return  for  this  alliance  gave  higher  wages, 
then,  indeed,  we  would  be  in  danger  of  the  so-called  "in- 
dustrial feudalism."  But  it  is  not  owing  to  the  reluctance 
of  the  capitalists  or  of  the  trade  unionists  that  such  a  system 
of  industry  may  not  some  day  be  imposed  upon  us.  That 
there  is  no  danger  of  this  fate  befalling  us  is  owing  to  the 
fact  that  such  a  state  of  affairs  would  be  an  economic  im- 
possibility. Of  this  the  existing  industrial  situation  alone 
is  sufficient  evidence. 

Here  we  have  the  Steel  Trust  with  their  market  flooded 
with  steel  products,  because  the  capitalists  who  have  been 
building  steel  buildings  and  laying  steel  rail  find  that  there 
is  no  longer  any  chance  of  profitable  extension  of  their 
business.  Therefore  they  don't  buy  steel,  and  the  steel  mills 
don't  make  it,  and  the  Steel  Trust  cannot  employ  men.    So 


148  Socialism  Inevitable 

that  even  if  the  Steel  Trust  were  willing  to  pay  the  highest 
wages  demanded,  it  could  not  do  so,  for  the  same  reason  that 
it  could  not  pay  even  the  lowest  wages,  namely,  because  it 
could  not  sell  its  product.  Hence,  any  combination  between 
the  Steel  Trust  and  its  employees  must  finally  fall  to  the 
ground  as  soon  as  the  market  for  steel  collapses;  and  such 
is  the  case  to-day. 

Thus  we  see  that  we  could  have  an  industrial  feudalism 
only  by  the  total  elimination  of  competition  among  the 
capitalists,  as  well  as  among  the  laborers,  and  not  only  in 
our  own  nation,  but  throughout  the  whole  world. 

It  must  be  remembered  that  there  is  one  great  class  of 
competitors  whom  no  union  can  ever  save  from  competition, 
and  that  is  the  farmers.  The  farmer  is  shown  by  actual 
statistics  to  get  less  return  from  his  farm  than  the  average 
wage-worker  gets  from  his  labor.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  he  is 
really  engaged  in  selling  his  labor,  just  as  much  as  the  wage- 
worker  is,  the  difference  being  that  he  doesn't,  like  the 
latter,  sell  it  directly  to  the  capitalist.  The  wheat  farmers 
of  the  world  are  engaged  in  competition,  one  against  the 
other,  in  the  sale  of  their  wheat,  Liverpool  fixing  the  price 
which  is  determined  by  the  cost  of  production  at  the  margin 
of  cultivation.  Now  the  great  majority  of  farmers  are 
working  at  approximately  this  margin  of  cultivation,  and 
are  hence  compelled  to  work  for  a  mere  subsistence  wage  like 
city  laborers.  The  fact  that  the  farmer  gets  paid  for  his 
wheat  instead  of  for  his  labor  does  not  alter  the  fact  that 
he  is  really  paid  a  competitive  wage,  just  as  much  as  is  the 
day  laborer. 

Now,  with  the  farming  class  ground  down  to  the  verge 
of  mere  subsistence  through  competition  in  the  sale  of  their 
products,  it  is  at  once  evident  that  they  cannot  get  enough 
for  these  products  to  avoid  overproduction,  unless  a  world- 
union  of  farmers  can  be  found  to  hold  up  the  price,  which, 
on  the  face  of  it,  is  an  impossibility. 

And  it  is  not  only  the  farmers  who  are  cutting  their  own 
throats  by  competition.  There  is  an  immense  body  of  small 
middle-class  men,  merchants,  etc.,  who,  in  the  same  way  are 
also  selling  their  services  for  a  mere  subsistence.  Then,  of 
course,  there  are  hundreds  of  thousands  of  laborers  who  can 
never  be  organized  into  a  trade  union  and  are  also  earning 


Mr.  Gompers  And  His  Little  Plan  149 

the  barest  living.  Practically  the  only  people  who  can  be 
raised  above  this  condition  are  the  present  members  of  the 
trade  unions,  who  constitute  only  about  one-ninth  of  the 
wage-workers  of  the  United  States.  And  even  with  the  trade 
unionists,  their  own  estimate  of  what  they  should  have  is 
so  very  low,  being  only  a  few  cents  a  day  above  a  subsistence 
wage,  that  even  if  all  the  organized  workers  got  trade  union 
wages  it  would  have  little  effect  in  relieving  the  glutted 
market  of  the  world. 

Lastly,  we  have  not  taken  into  consideration  the  compe- 
tition of  those  capitalists  who  are  unable  to  enter  into  a  Trust 
and  have  the  price  of  their  products  lowered  by  competition 
exactly  as  are  those  of  the  farmer.  That  is,  the  capitalist 
himself  lowers  his  prices  in  the  struggle  for  a  market. 

This  theory  of  an  industrial  feudalism  is  one  of  the  wildest 
and  most  ridiculous  ideas  that  has  ever  originated  in  the 
mind  of  man ;  but,  luckily,  outside  of  a  few  dreamy  Socialists 
of  the  half-baked  variety,  who  are  so  far  removed  from  the 
actual  affairs  of  this  world,  that  what  they  think  is  of  no 
importance,  it  is  held  by  no  one. 

Another  idea  that  is  being  suggested  in  this  connection 
is  equally  absurd.  It  is  that  the  capitalists  when  they  see  a 
period  of  depression  coming  on,  and  find  that  they  cannot 
utilize  labor  in  productive  enterprises,  will  transfer  it  from 
productive  occupations  and  use  it  to  create  luxuries.  To 
speak  concretely:  If  Mr.  Schwab,  who  is  a  large  holder  of 
Steel  Trust  stock,  finds  that  there  is  a  decline  in  the  demand 
for  steel,  and  that  he  cannot  employ  laborers  to  make  more, 
he  will  take  five  thousand  men  away  from  the  steel  mills  and 
set  them  to  work  raising  roses  in  his  garden. 

The  absurdity  of  this  is  at  once  evident  when  it  is  re- 
membered that  when  overproduction  of  steel  exhibits  itself 
it  means  that  a  much  lower  price  will  be  paid  for  steel.  This 
means  a  tremendous  falling  off  in  the  profits  of  the  Steel 
Trust,  and  naturally  a  great  diminution  of  Mr.  Schwab's  in- 
come. It  may  be  that  his  income  may  sink  to  practically 
nothing,  if  all  his  capital  is  invested  in  the  Steel  Trust.  So 
that  these  Utopian  dreamers  would  argue  that  the  moment 
Schwab's  income  sinks  to  zero,  it  will  be  the  signal  for  him 
to  employ  thousands  of  men  in  growing  roses,  merely  to 


150  Socialism  Inevitable 

keep  them  employed.    Just  when  Mr.  Schwab  would  naturally 
economize  he  is  to  splurge. 

Further  analysis  of  this  ridiculous  suggestion  is  quite 
unnecessary.  It  is  even  more  absurd  than  Mr.  Gompers'  idea 
of  the  capitalists  keeping  up  high  wages  on  a  falling  market. 
There  is  no  future  for  this  country  except  through  Socialism, 
and  there  is  no  possibility  of  benevolent  feudalism,  or  any 
other  thing,  side-tracking  the  irresistible  movement  of  human- 
ity to  its  inevitable  goal. 


Ameeica  Suffocating  With  Wealth  151 


AMERICA  SUFFOCATING  WITH  WEALTH 

(February,  1904.) 

THE  particular  mission  that  this  magazine  has  taken 
upon  itself  is  to  show  the  people  of  the  United  States 
that  their  ability  to  produce  has  so  far  outrun  their 
capacity  to  consume,  under  the  limitations  of  the  existing 
wage  system,  that  there  is  necessarily  piling  up  a  huge  mass 
of  unconsumed  products  which  will  soon  cause  a  cry  of 
"overproduction."  This  will  be  followed  by  a  tremendous 
fall  in  prices,  accompanied  by  a  terrible  unemployed  problem. 
"We  cannot  employ  men  to  make  unsalable  goods,"  will  be  the 
plaint  of  the  employers. 

We  present  innumerable  facts  to  support  this  contention, 
but  the  most  ominous  one  of  all  is  the  blindness  of  the 
American  public  in  failing  to  see  the  significance  of  present 
conditions.  And  when  we  say  the  American  public  we  wish 
it  to  be  understood  that  we  include  every  class,  and  those  of 
every  belief,  economic,  social,  and  religious. 

It  might  be  thought  by  some  that  inasmuch  as  we  are 
proposing  Socialism  as  the  remedy  for  this  impending  calam- 
ity, that  all  Socialists,  or  at  any  rate  a  great  part  of  theni, 
share  with  us  our  belief  in  the  imminence  of  the  collapse-of 
our  existing  industrial  and  financial  structure. 

This,  we  reluctantly  confess,  is  not  the  case.  The  vast 
majority  of  the  Socialists,  so  far  as  we  can  ascertain,  no 
more  believe  in  the  imminence  of  any  unprecedented  industrial 
crisis  than  do  the  general  public.  The  Socialist  theory,  as 
delineated  by  Marx,  it  is  true,  compels  them  to  a  pious  belief 
that  at  some  old  day  and  at  some  old  time  or  other  we  will 
necessarily  face  such  a  crisis,  but  that  it  is  really  now  at 
hand  there  are  few  Socialists  to  admit.  If  Gabriel  should 
blow  his  trumpet  to-day  most  men  would  say,  "Hear  that  big 
megaphone !"  We  speak  of  this  merely  to  show  that  a  belief 
in  the  theory  of  Socialism  derived  from  the  study  of  books 


152  Socialism  Inevitable 

written  fifty  years  ago,  unless  fortified  by  understanding^ 
reading  the  facts  of  to-day,  is  of  little  value  to  a  man  in  in- 
terpreting current  economic  events  and  their  bearing  upon 
the  Socialist  movement.  ' 

The  people  of  the  United  States  seem  about  to  plunge  into 
the  greatest  crisis  known  in  the  history  of  man  with  prac- 
tically no  warning,  not  even  from  those  whose  object  in 
life  should  be  to  give  warning*  In  proof  of  which  we  submit 
a  short  resume  of  the  last  U.  S.  census  report : 

The  population  in  1903  is  estimated  at  80,372,000,  against  23,- 
191,876  in  1850,  and  5,308,483  in  1800.  The  wealth  of  the  country 
is  placed  at  $94,000,000,000  in  1900,  and  it  is  declared  that  $100,- 
000,000,000  would  not  be  an  unreasonable  estimate  for  1903, 
whereas  for  1850  the  wealth  of  the  country  stood  at  $7,000,000,000. 
The  per  capita  wealth  is  set  down  at  $1,235  in  1900,  and  $307  in 
1850,  having  thus  more  than  quadrupled.  The  interest-bearing 
debt  in  1903  is  $914,000,000,  against  $1,724,000,000  in  1880,  and 
$2,046,000,000  in  1870.  Thus  the  per  capita  indebtedness  of  the 
country  in  1903  is  $11.51,  against  $60.46  in  1870. 

Gold  and  gold  certificates  in  circulation  in  1903  for  the  first 
time  exceeded  $1,000,000,000,  or,  to  be  exact,  $1,031,000,000,  against 
$810,000,000  in  1900  and  $232,000,000  in  1880.  The  total  money  in 
circulation  in  1903  was  $2,367,000,000,  against  $1,429,000,000  in 
1890,  $973,000,000  in  1880,  $675,000,000  in  1870,  and  $435,000,000  in 
1860.  Deposits  in  savings  banks  in  1903  were  $2,935,000,000, 
against  $1,524,000,000  in  1890,  $550,000,000  in  1870,  and  $149,- 
000,000  in  1860. 

The  value  of  manufactures  for  the  census  year  1900  is  given 
at  $13,000,000,000,  against  $5,333,000,000  in  1880,  and  less  than 
$2,000,000,000  in  1860.  Railways  in  operation  in  1902  had  203,132 
miles  of  track,  against  166,703  in  1890;  93,262  in  1880,  52,922  in 
1870,  30,626  in  1860,  and  9,021  in  1850. 

Coal  production  increased  in  nine  years  from  162,814,977  tons 
in  1893  to  269,081,049  in  1902.  Steel  shows  the  remarkable  in- 
crease from  4,019,995  tons  in  1893  to  14,947,250  tons  in  1902,  while 
exported  manufactures,  in  the  same  nine  years,  increased  from 
$158,023,118  to  $407,526,159,  and  the  total  imports  from  $866,400,- 
922  to  $1,025,719,237. 

The  excess  of  total  exports  over  total  imports  in  1903  was 
$394,422,442,  while  in  1893  it  stood  at  $18,735,728. 

How  anyone,  after  reading  these  figures,  particularly  those 
comparing  1890  with  1900,  can  fail  to  see  the  overwhelming 
support  that  they  give  to  our  argument  we  cannot  understand. 
In  1893  we  were  in  the  depths  of  despair  from  an  economic 


America  Suffocating  With  Wealth  153 

standpoint.  We  seemed  to  have  built  everything  that  was 
to  be  built  and  there  was  no  employment  for  either  labor  or 
capital.  The  figures  show  us  how  much  we  were  mistaken 
when  we  compare  1900  with  1890  and  notice  the  enormous 
amount  of  capital  that  has  found  its  way  into  almost  every 
conceivable  trade  channel  from  banking  to  railways. 

Some  might  say  that  if  it  is  admitted  that  in  1893  we 
were  mistaken  in  thinking  capital  could  not  be  consumed, 
then  may  we  not  be  equally  mistaken  in  1904.  We  answer 
that  the  conditions  are  different.  In  the  first  place  the  tre- 
mendous augmentation  of  our  capital  which  has  occurred  in 
the  last  ten  years  affords  a  great  bar  to  additional  capital 
being  similarly  consumed.  The  trusts  are  the  tangible 
evidence  of  this.  The  Trust  is  the  sign  of  overproduction. 
That  there  will  be  some  capital  used,  that  there  will  even  be 
immense  sums  used,  we  do  not  for  a  moment  deny,  but  that 
there  will  be  enough  capital  consumed  adequately  to  employ 
the  labor  of  this  country  we  absolutely  refuse  to  believe, 
unless  a  great  European  war  intervenes.  Barring  a  great  war 
nothing  can  keep  our  capitalist  system  alive  for  another  ten 
years. 

In  order  for  capitalism  to  live  men  must  die  as  they  have 
died  in  the  past  in  the  fetid  sweat  shop,  in  the  deadly  dust  of 
the  cotton  mill,  and  in  the  poison  of  the  lead  factories. 
Men  have  long  been  dying  of  starvation  from  unemployment 
as  well;  but  all  the  slaughter  of  the  past  is  nothing  to 
what  will  be  necessary  for  the  future  if  capitalism  is  to  have 
a  longer  lease  of  life,  and  even  with  all  the  slaughtering  we 
shall  find  the  task  in  vain,  for  Socialism  is  bound  to  come  in 
any  event.  Let  no  one  think  we  are  referring  to  any  slaughter 
resulting  from  an  attempt  to  force  the  change.  We  do  not 
expect  anything  of  the  sort.  It  will  be  unnecessary  and  im- 
possible. The  slaughtering  of  men  on  our  railways,  and  of 
women  and  children  in  our  bake-oven  Chicago  theatres,  let 
alone  the  slaughter  of  war,  is  quite  enough.  The  next  great 
upward  move  of  humanity  must  not,  and  shall  not,  be  begun 
by  a  sacrifice  of  life.  If  anyone  wishes  to  do  any  sacrificing, 
let  him  begin  on  himself. 

But  why  talk  about  "sacrifice"  either  of  life  or  of  happi- 
ness? What  we  propose  is  just  the  opposite.  Here  is  a  vast 
nation — the  United  States — proved  by  every  form  of  statistics 


154  Socialism  Inevitable 

to  be  rich  beyond  measure  in  everything  that  makes  for 
health,  happiness  and  life.  The  wealth  is  the  Nation's.  We 
are  the  Nation.    Ergo :  let  us  have  what  is  ours. 

Let  the  Nation  Own  the  Trusts,  and  "we"  will  own  the 
trusts.  Then  "we"  will  be  happy,  for  we  will  have  abolished 
the  great  cause  of  unhappiness — poverty. 


Wall  Street  Journal  Turns  Moralist         155 


WALL  ST.  JOURNAL  TURNS  MORALIST 

(February,  1904.) 

I  BELIEVE  in  playing  a  fair  game  or  not  playing  at  all. 
If  you  enter  into  a  contest,  having  agreed  beforehand 
upon  the  rules  of  play,  and  then  find  yourself  getting 
beaten,  you  will  stick  by  the  agreement  and  take  your 
medicine — that  is,  if  you  have  any  sand.  You  must  either  do 
that  or  play  the  baby  act  and  ask  for  a  modification  of  the 
rules  to  fit  your  special  case. 

If  you  want  to  play,  stick  to  the  rules ;  if  you  do  not  want 
to  play  say  so,  or  ask  for  a  new  deal  and  a  new  set  of  rules. 

Now  we  Americans  entered  a  long  time  ago  upon  a  game  of 
competition  in  money-making.  We  established  certain  rules 
at  the  beginning,  and  now  that  Kockefeller  and  Morgan  are 
beating  us,  have  no  right  to  whine  and  at  the  same  time 
insist  on  the  continuance  of  the  game.  The  general  rule 
was  competition  to  a  finish ;  let  the  best  man  win.  The  fellow 
who  could  quote  the  lowest  price  should  have  the  market; 
let"  bankruptcy  engulf  the  high-price  man. 

Now  I,  myself,  am  perfectly  consistent  in  my  attitude. 
Let  others  be  the  same.  I  say  that  Kockefeller  and  Morgan 
and  Gates  and  Hill,  with  their  immense  bank  accounts,  can 
get  away  with  us  poor  small  fry  in  this  competitive  game, 
and  that  I,  for  one,  have  had  enough  of  it.  I  am  licked,  I 
confess  it ;  and  I  have  sense  enough  to  throw  up  the  sponge. 
I  call  for  a  new  deal  and  new  rules.  I  want  the  earth  made 
subject  to  a  re-division,  and  I  wish  rules  made  that  will  for- 
ever prevent  its  ownership  passing  out  of  the  hands  of  the 
people.  I  say  that  when  the  government  owns  the  capital 
of  this  country  just  as  it  now  owns  our  national  parks  and 
our  post  office,  then  will  be  established  a  permanent  equality 
of  wealth ;  and  never  until  this  is  done  will  men  be  content. 

Now  if  we  should  try  to  think  of  some  one  person  who  is 
satisfied  with  the  existing  order  of  things  and  upon  whose 
lips  is  the  cry:    "Let  well  enough  alone;  stand  pat,"  we 


156  Socialism  Inevitable 

would  most  likely  have  thought  of  the  editor  of  the  Wall 
Street  Journal. 

But  if  we  did,  we  certainly  have  another  think  coming, 
for  this  is  the  cry-baby  talk  I  find  in  this  morning's  (Dec.  16) 
editorial : 

BUSINESS  AND  THE  LAW. 

We  observe  that  several  papers  which  have  reprinted  and 
commented  upon  the  little  anecdote  printed  in  this  column  some 
time  ago,  dealing  with  two  factories  and  the  method  by  which  a 
capitalist  proposed  to  acquire  the  prosperous  factory,  have  ap- 
parently misunderstood  the  general  drift  of  our  remarks  there- 
upon. We  printed  the  story  mainly  to  point  out  that  the  law 
permitted  the  doing  of  a  great  many  things  in  the  way  of  busi- 
ness, which  were,  in  a  moral  sense,  nothing  better  than  highway 
robbery.  We  did  not,  as  one  or  two  of  our  more  ingenuous,  if 
hasty,  commentators  assumed,  at  all  venture  to  justify  such  acts. 

To  speak  plainly,  we  see  no  essential  difference  between  the 
taking  of  a  competitor's  business  away  from  him  by  extreme 
competition,  that  is,  by  competition  not  warranted  on  any  other 
motive,  and  the  forcible  abstraction  of  portable  property  from 
one  man  by  another  man  stronger  than  himself.  We  do  not  regard 
it  as  morally  defensible,  for  example,  for  a  man  to  establish 
himself  alongside  someone  else  and  proceed  to  take  away  the 
business  of  that  someone  else,  using  for  that  purpose  the  brute 
force  of  money  spent  in  selling  at  a  loss,  any  more  than  we  should 
regard  it  as  morally  defensible  for  him  to  accomplish  the  same 
purpose  by  brute  force  of  arms.  The  purpose  is  immoral.  It 
involves  the  taking  away  of  that  which  belongs  to  someone  else 
by  other  than  fair  competition.  Of  course,  such  a  process  is  as 
common  as  can  be  in  the  business  world,  and  is  perfectly  legal. 
The  Standard  Oil  Company  was  charged  with  this  kind  of  thing 
at  practically  all  stages  of  its  existence.  Apparently  no  Standard 
Oil  representative  has  ever  felt  it  necessary  to  deny  the  charge. 

The  fact  of  the  matter  is  that  the  conventions  of  the  business 
world,  expressed  in  the  law,  have  simply  replaced  the  exercise  of 
mere  brute  force,  leaving  the  article  of  the  decalogue  against 
stealing  expressed  only  so  far  as  the  stealing  is  accomplished  by 
actual  physical  force  or  by  absolute  fraud.  Beyond  this  the 
moral  law  finds  no  expression  in  the  law  of  business. 

Now,  I  have  often  read  this  kind  of  tommy-rot  before, 
usually  in  such  periodicals  as  the  Christian  Herald  or  the 
War  Cry,  but  to  find  it  in  the  Wall  Street  Journal  is  too 
funny  for  words. 

The  Journal  believes  in  competition  all  right,  so  long  as 
you  do  not  compete  to  the  extent  of  taking  away  the  other 
fellows'  business  by  selling  below  cost.  He  wants  a  fight, 
but  insists  on  no  broken  heads. 


Wall  Street  Journal  Turns  Moralist         157 

Pray,  what  right  has  the  Journal  to  tell  me  how  I  am  to 
spend  my  money  and  what  my  selling  price  is  to  be?  And 
besides,  how  is  it  to  determine  what  my  "cost"  is?  I  may 
be  selling  at  a  price  which  renders  me  a  profit,  but  which 
would  mean  a  loss  to  my  competitor.  I  may  have  a  superior 
process ;  I  may  control  the  sources  of  supply ;  I  may  own  my 
own  property  while  he  must  pay  rent;  I  may  have  a  much 
bigger  plant ;  and  so,  simply  because  I  have  more  money  and 
can  afford  to  sell  for  less,  I  capture  my  competitor's  business. 

Now,  why  do  I  have  a  bigger  capital?  Why^  in  fact,  do  I 
have  any  capital  at  all?  Do  I  own  capital  for  the  purpose 
of  fulfilling  the  moral  law  ?  Not  at  all.  I  own  it  that  I  may 
make  money,  and  for  that  purpose  only. 

It  is  true  that  it  is  not  so  very  many  years  since  men  were 
wont  to  think  of  the  moral  law  and  the  business  law  as 
much  the  same  thing.  It  is  a  comparatively  modern  view, 
this  of  the  Wall  Street  Journal,  that  a  man  who,  by  reason 
of  superior  capital,  cripples  or  ruins  another  is  morally  in 
the  same  class  as  a  highwayman,  though  financially  eligible 
to  be  a  member  of  young  Mr.  Rockefeller's  Bible  Class. 

If  we  are  to  have  private  capital  and  competition,  then  let 
us  have  it  and  play  the  game  according  to  rule.  Let  the  big 
man  devour  the  little  man;  he  has  a  right  to  his  prey.  It's 
too  late  altogether  for  the  Wall  Street  Journal,  speaking  for 
the  smaller  capitalists  who  are  being  driven  to  cover  by  the 
superior  capital  of  Rockefeller,  to  cry  "quarter."  There  is 
no  quarter.  It  is  war  to  the  knife,  and  the  knife  to  the  hilt. 
There  can  be  no  quarter  under  capitalism  and  competition, 
and  I  ask  for  none.  I  demand  justice,  which  can  come  only 
with  Socialism. 


158  Socialism  Inevitable 


WALLACE'S  GREAT  BOOK 

(February,   1904.) 

I  suppose  there  are  many  who  have  gone  through  the  same 
evolution  of  thought  as  myself.  Born  and  raised  in  an 
orthodox  family,  which  held  firmly  to  the  Mosaic  account 
of  creation  and  the  anthropomorphic  conception  of  a  deity, 
I  not  only  threw  off  such  superstitions,  but,  as  is  natural, 
came  to  regard  everything  along  the  line  of  conventional 
religious  belief  as  absurd  and  unworthy  of  reverence.  I  think 
this  is  the  course  that  most  Socialists  have  gone  through.  First 
we  discard  our  orthodox  belief  in  religion,  and  then,  in  time, 
our  no  less  orthodox  views  in  economics. 

Nevertheless,  strange  as  it  may  seem,  the  more  a  man 
studies  Socialism  the  more  he  comes  to  understand  and 
sympathize  with  many  orthodox  religious  ideas  that  at  an 
early  period  in  the  evolution  of  his  thought  he  had  scorned. 
For  instance,  he  finds  men  talking  the  Golden  Eule-  and 
practising  Cut  Your  Neighbor's  Throat;  and  when  he  learns 
that  the  practice  is  necessary  to  preserve  existence,  while  the 
theory  means  suicide,  he  says  that  this  preaching  a  rule  that 
can  never  be  practised  is  the  limit  of  absurdity.  Later  on, 
however,  he  becomes  a  Socialist  and  finds  that  the  theory 
would  work  all  right  if  we  only  had  a  socialistic  world  to 
practice  it  in.  Then,  when  he  feels  that  we  should  have  such 
a  world,  and  that  eventually  we  must  have  such  a  world,  he 
begins  to  have  more  respect  for  the  Golden  Eule. 

Before  he  understands  Socialism,  moreover,  he  scoffs  at  the 
idea  of  thanking  God  for  daily  bread,  which  he  doesn't  get ; 
but  later  on  he  sees  that  it  is  man's  fault  and  not  God's  that 
he  goes  hungry,  and  understands  that  he,  himself,  is  one  of 
the  very  men  who  have  been  supporting  the  system  which 
makes  men  go  hungry  when  God  has  done  his  part  in  pro- 
viding plenty  for  all. 

And  so,  from  day  to  day,  he  gets  to  realize  that  after  all 


Wallace's  Great  Book  159 

there  is  a  much  better  basis  for  certain  religious- theories  than 
he  had  at  one  time  thought  possiBIeralthough  he  also  knows 
that  the  reason  for  his  increasing  respect  tor  such  theories 
does  not  in  the  least  justify  blind  believers  in  religious  dogma. 

One  of  the  chief  tenets  of  most  religions  is  that  our  planet 
is  the  centre  of  the  universe,  that  the  sun  revolves  around  it, 
and  that  the  moon  and  stars  are  simply  created  to  light  it 
up  and  make  the  heavens  more  beautiful  for  the  edification 
and  enjoyment  of  the  greatest  thing  ever  created,  Man.  In 
short,  that  it  was  all  done  for  man,  and  that  man  is  the  image 
of  God,  and  the  next  thing  to  divinity  itself. 

The  early  astronomical  discoveries  in  the  Middle  Ages, 
however,  so  upset  conventional  beliefs  of  this  kind  that  as- 
tronomers, such  as  Galileo,  had  a  most  difficult  time  of  it 
with  the  Church  when  they  announced  that  it  is  the  earth  that 
moves  around  the  sun.  Time  passed;  discovery  after  dis- 
covery was  made ;  and  instead  of  the  Earth  being  the  centre 
of  things,  about  which  all  else  revolved,  it  was  found  to  be 
simply  a  grain  of  sand  in  a  universe  of  apparently  infinite 
matter,  and  not  to  be  compared  in  size  with  many  of  the 
planets  in  our  own  solatf  system,  while  in  comparison  with 
the  sun  it  is  about  as  a  pea  to  an  orange. 

And  then,  when  we  found  that  the  fixed  stars  were  millions 
in  number,  and  nearly  all  larger  than  our  own  sun,  we  natur- 
ally jumped  to  the  conclusion  that  these  other  suns  must 
have  systems  of  planets  of  their  own;  and  that,  therefore, 
there  are  millions  and  millions  of  planets  like  the  Earth,  all 
quite  as  suitable  for  human  life,  and  most  likely  supporting 
life,  or  otherwise  why  should  they  have  been  created  ? 

The  next  step  in  reasoning  from  the  "most  likely"  was 
to  the  "without  doubt,"  and  from  that  to  the  'unquestionably" 
was  a  small  step.  And  all  these  steps  were  much  the  more 
easily  taken  by  men  like  myself  who — I  confess  it  to  my 
shame — were  naturally  disposed  to  adopt  any  theory  that 
would  still  further  discredit  the  orthodox  religious  view  that 
the  earth  is  the  centre  of  things  and  that  man  is  the  only 
creature  worth  while  upon  the  earth. 

It  has  been  so  long  since  I  have  taken  much  interest  in 
religious  matters,  if  I  ever  did  take  an  interest,  that  when 


160  Socialism  Inevitable 

a  book*  like  Wallace's  comes  along  and  tends  to  upset  all 
my  old  ideas  upon  the  subject  of  "Other  Worlds  Than  Ours" 
it  is  naturally  of  intense  interest  to  me. 

Dr.  Wallace's  conclusions  are:  (1)  The  stellar  universe 
forms  one  collective  whole,  and,  though  of  enormous  extent, 
is  yet  finite,  its  extent  being  determinable.  (2)  The  solar 
system  is  situated  in  the  plane  of  the  Milky  Way,  and  not 
far  removed  from  the  centre  of  that  plane.  (3)  The  uni- 
verse throughout  consists  of  the  same  kind  of  matter,  and  is 
subject  to  the  same  physical  and  chemical  laws.  These  are 
the  first  three  conclusions  he  arrives  at,  but  he  adds  three 
others  which  seem  favored  by  the  highest  probability.  These 
are:  (4)  The  only  planet  in  our  solar  system  inhabited 
or  inhabitable  is  the  Earth.  (5)  The  probabilities  are 
almost  as  great  against  any  other  sun  possessing  inhabited 
planets.  (6)  The  nearly  central  position  of  our  sun  is  prob- 
ably a  permanent  one,  and  has  been  specially  favorable — 
perhaps  absolutely  essential — to  life-development  on  the  earth. 

His  first  proposition,  that  the  universe  is  finite,  and  not 
infinite  as  is  generally  held,  is  of  the  greatest  interest  and 
importance.  The  theory  of  a  finite  universe  is  in  line  with 
Socialist  philosophy,  which  regards  the  human  race  as  an 
organism,  and  likewise  with  my  own  particular  theory  that 
the  universe  itself  is  an  organism.  For  it  is  manifestly  in- 
congruous to  think  of  a  thing  as  an  .organism,  and  at  the 
same  time  being  infinite;  and  if  the  stenar^aniverse  is  one 
collective  whole  then  it  must  be  finite.  When  a  little  child 
looks  out  on  the  Earth  he  at  first  regards  it  as  infinite  and 
unrelated:  only  with  increasing  age  and  understanding  can 
he  ever  realize  that  it  is  finite  and  organized. 

Thus  when  Eockefeller  as  a  lad  went  into  the  oil  business 
it  seemed  to  him  that  there  was  infinite  scope  for  expansion. 
That  the  business  would  ever  be  so  organized  and  extended 
as  to  embrace  the  entire  earth,  was  quite  beyond  the  wildest 
of  his  speculations,  and  yet  it  has  all  occurred  within  his  own 
lifetime,  and  due  largely  to  his  own  exertion.  The  logic  of 
events  was  his  best  instructor  in  the  philosophy  of  the  oil 


♦Man's  Place  in  the  Universe:  A  Study  of  the  Results  of 
Scientific  Research  in  Relation  to  the  Unity  or  Plurality  of 
Worlds.    By  Alfred  R.  Wallace,  L.L.D.,  D.C.L.,  F.R.S.,  etc. 


Wallace's  Great  Book  161 

business.  And  just  as  the  oil  business  extended  its  conscious 
organization  so  have  other  businesses  extended  theirs,  until 
to-day  it  is  only  one  of  many  branches  of  trade  that  are  on 
the  road  to  a  worldwide  sphere  of  operation. 

Now  it  is  apparent  that  Mr.  Rockefeller  can  never  have 
complete  knowledge  and  control  of  the  oil  business  until  he 
has  accomplished  a  world  organization.  To  know  it  he  must 
know  its  limitations.  Similarly  we  cannot  understand  the 
universe  unless  we  know  its  limitations. 

To  me  this  Wallace  theory  of  a  finite  universe  must  be 
true  because  it  accords  with  my  deepest  philosophy  of  life. 
If  the  universe  is  infinite  and,  therefore,  unorganized,  then 
there  would  be  no  motive — that  is,  no  valid  fundamental 
motive — for  men  to  work  for  Socialism,  or  in  fact,  even  to 
desire  to  live.  For  of  what  use  is  Socialism  if  it  is  simply 
to  make  this  world  a  better  place  for  men  to  live  in  and 
nothing  more?  Upon  such  a  theory  of  life  we  might  be 
compared  to  intelligent  cattle  preparing  a  more  comfortable 
stable  for  ourselves. 

Suppose  we  do  introduce  Socialism  and  abolish  poverty  ? 
This  can  be  done  easily  enough,  but  why  should  we  wish  to 
do  it?  It  is  no  answer  to  say  that  we  do  it  to  increase  the 
stock  of  human  happiness,  for  then  I  would  ask  why  should 
anyone  wish  to  increase  human  happiness?  The  reason  one 
wishes  to  increase  human  happiness  is  fundamentally  a  self- 
ish one:  it  is  to  increase  his  own  happiness  by  becoming  a 
cell  in  a  healthier  organization  of  human  society  than  that 
which  now  exists. 

If  one  of  your  fingers  is  crushed,  the  injured  cells  are  not 
more  anxious  to  become  well  again  than  the  uninjured  cells 
in  your  other  fingers  are  to  have  them  well.  There  is  no 
single  uninjured  cell  in  your  whole  body  that  is  less  inter- 
ested in  having  the  injured  cells  made  whole  than  if  it  were 
itself  injured.  Now,  why  is  this?  Simply  that  the  body  is 
an  organism,  and  a  very  self-conscious  organism.  It  knows 
that  for  the  whole  to  be  well,  the  parts  must  be  well.  There 
are  some  insects  which  are  organized  well  enough  physically, 
but  whose  nerve  centres  are  so  badly  correlated  that  they  have 
little  or  no  consciousness  of  any  injury  to  themselves.  Some 
wasps,  for  instance,  may  be  beheaded  and  the  head  will  go  on 
unconcernedly  taking  food.    Really  to  live,  a  body  must  not 


c 


162  Socialism  Inevitable 

only  be  organized  but  also  conscious  of  its  organism.  As 
individual  men  we  are  simply  cells  in  the  greater  organism, 
human  society,  and  only  as  we  feel  this  do  we  tend  to  realize 
the  highest  life.  It  is  impossible  for  any  single  cell  in  an 
undeveloped  organism  to  realize  itself,  by  its  own  will  alone. 
It  can  do  so  only  through  the  development  of  the  entire 
organism.  I  may  wish  to  send  a  telegram  from  New  York 
to  Boston,  but  the  mere  wish  is  not  enough  to  accomplish 
the  act.  Wires  must  be  laid,  the  instruments  connected  and 
men  must  be  ready  to  co-operate  in  the  work  before  the 
message  can  go.  However,  if  I  never  had  the  wish  to  send  any 
message,  and  if  no  one  else  ever  had,  there  would  never  have 
been  any  telegraph  wires  laid.  Therefore,  to  realize  my  desire 
I  must  have  first  the  wish,  and  then  an  organism  that  I  can 
use  to  consummate  that  wish. 

Man  as  a  unit  is  nothing.  It  is  only  as  he  is  useful  to  the 
whole  that  he  lives.    And  only  as  he  is  useful  is  he  happy. 

Again,  he  cannot  be  of  much  use  if  the  whole  be  badly 
organized.  I  may  have  a  perfect  foot,  but  if  my  leg  is  broken 
the  foot  is  of  little  use,  and  so,  indeed,  is  my  whole  body. 
I  may  be  a  perfect  man,  but  if  society  is  so  badly  organized 
that  I  am  not  fed,  then  I  am  of  no  more  use  to  society  than 
if  I  did  not  exist,  just  as  the  perfect  foot  would  be  useless 
to  the  body  if  the  blood  did  not  flow  to  nourish  it.  The  foot, 
to  support  the  body,  must  first  be  supported  by  the  body. 
All  this  is  axiomatic  and  has  been  said,  and  better  said,  many 
times  before;  but  that  the  individual  is  a  cell  in  human 
society  is  more  quickly  recognized  than  that  society  is  merely 
a  cell  in  a  much  greater  organism,  that  of  the  universe  itself. 

We  are  the  result  of  evolutionary  development  in  adapting 
ourselves  to  our  environment.  That  we  have  taught  our- 
selves to  live  on  the  land  instead  of  in  the  water  is  one  of 
the  commonplaces  of  evolution,  and  it  is  quite  obvious  that  we 
are  now  land  animals  and  need  land  to  live  upon.  That  we 
have  temporarily  given  up  our  title  to  land  to  a  small  class 
of  people  called  landlords  is  beside  the  mark.  We  will  take 
it  back  whenever  we  really  want  it.  However,  that  we  must 
have  land,  I  say,  is  obvious,  and  it  is  likewise  obvious  that 
we  must  have  air.  And,  more  than  that,  as  Professor  Wallace 
points  out,  we  must  have  the  small  amount  of  carbonic  acid 
gas  that  is  in  the  air.    If  it  were  not  there  plants  could  not 


Wallace's  Great  Book  163 

live,  and  if  there  were  no  plants  there  would  be  no  food  for 
animals. 

Wallace  goes  on  pointing  out  one  thing  after  another  in 
our  physical  universe  that  is  necessary  to  our  existence, — 
things  we  ourselves  hardly  think  of  at  all.  For  instance,  he 
shows  the  atmospheric  dust  to  be  absolutely  necessary  to  life, 
for  otherwise  there  would  be  no  clouds,  and  without  clouds 
we  would  be  in  all  kinds  of  a  muss,  for  the  details  of  which 
I  must  refer  the  curious  to  the  book  itself.  And  not  only 
is  the  atmospheric  dust  a  good  thing  physically,  but  to  it 
we  likewise  owe  the  blue  of  our  skies.  And  here  it  may  be 
remarked  that  not  only  is  the  material  universe  necessary  to 
us  physically,  but  it  also  has  an  aesthetic  and  spiritual  value 
of  perhaps  no  less  vital  importance.  Suppose  you  were  fed 
properly,  and  had  all  the  physical  necessities  of  life,  but  were 
told  that  you  and  all  humanity  would  forever  be  denied  any 
contact  whatsoever  with  a  material  universe?  That  you 
would  never  see  the  sea,  nor  the  mountains,  nor  birds,  nor 
animals,  nor  flowers,  nor  stars,  nor  moon,  nor  sun;  how 
would  such  a  prospect  strike  you?  You  would  be  likely  to 
feel  that  you  might  as  well  be  dead.  Or  suppose  you  were  to 
suffer  a  painless  amputation  of  the  various  members  of  your 
body.  First  you  lose  a  hand,  then  a  foot,  then  an  ear,  and 
so  on  until  "you"  are  finally  reduced  to  a  trunkless  head; 
would  you  consider  life  worth  living  ?  i 

Professor  Wallace  suggests  that  it  is  quite  possible  that  the 
remotest  star  is  just  as  necessary  to  our  physical  life  as  is 
the  minute  quantity  of  carbonic  acid  gas  in  our  atmosphere. 
He  puts  the  suggestion  purely  upon  the  physical  basis,  how- 
ever, whereas  I  extend  the  possibility  to  the  star's  being  not 
only  a  physical  but  a  spiritual  necessity.  Indeed,  is  it  not 
even  possible  the  spiritual  and  physical  are  the  same? 

It  seems  to  me  that  the  only  sane  hypothesis  of  life  is  that 
each  individual  life  is  dependent  upon  the  universe  for  its 
existence,  and  that  we  have  no  right  to  suppose  the  slightest 
grain  of  matter  could  be  lost  from  the  remotest  star  without 
its  having  a  profound  effect  upon  all  life,  upon  the  spiritual  as 
well  as  upon  the  physical  basis  of  life.  And  just  as  we  can- 
not imagine  any  adequate  life  for  the  individual  cells  in  our 
body  unless  that  body  itself  be  alive,  and  alive  spiritually 
as  well  as  mentally  and  physically,  so  we  are  wrong  in  think- 


164:  Socialism  Inevitable 

ing  it  possible  for  the  individual  man  to  be  really  alive  unless 
human  society  also  is  alive  and  conscious.  Moreover,  just  to 
the  extent  that  man  is  conscious  of  being  a  part  of  society, 
and  society  is  conscious  that  each  and  every  man  is  a  part 
of  it,  to  that  extent  does  the  life  of  man  increase. 

The  greatest  capacity  for  life  would  exist  in  a  man  de- 
veloped to  the  highest  degrw~s^ri^imM^mentally  and  physic- 
ally,  and  living  in  a  self-conscious  'society  having  the  most 
perfect  command  of- and  knowledge  of  itself,  and  of  its  own 
relation  to  the  universe. 

This  takes  us  back  to  the  original  premise,  namely  that 
the  universe  must  be  finite  if  it  is  an  organism,  and  it  must 
be  an  organism,  otherwise  man  would  lose  his  motive  to  live. 
That  is,  there  would  be  no  man.  Man  lives  in  order  to  unite 
himself  as  a  harmonious  chord  to  a  harmonious  society.  He 
lives  that  one  day  he  may  hear  the  morning  stars  sing,  and 
that  he  may  sing  in  unison  with  them.  He  lives  that  he  may 
be  one  of  the  pipes  in  the  organ  of  the  universe,  and  he  lives 
that  he  may  play  that  organ.  In  the  day  to  come  man  will 
feel  himself  not  only  a  part  of  a  conscious  society  but  of 
a  conscious  universe,  and  the  universe  will  feel  that  each  man 
is  a  part  of  it.  Socialism  as  a  movement  towards  the  har- 
monious organization  of  human  society  is,  then,  but  one  step 
toward  the  greatest  of  all  ends — the  harmonious  organization 
of  the  universe. 

But  I  have  dwelt  so  long  upon  the  first  proposition  that  I 
have  given  myself  little  space  for  the  others.  His  second 
proposition  is  somewhat  analogous  to  his  sixth,  and  depends 
upon  the  acceptance  of  the  first.  If  the  Earth  is  near  the 
centre  of  the  universe,  then  we  must  first  conceive  of  the 
universe  as  finite,  for  it  is  not  possible  that  infinity  could 
have  a  centre.  Where  there  are  no  bounds,  there  can  be  no 
centre.  In  Wallace's  theory  the  Earth  is  at  the  approximate 
centre  of  the  universe;  and  he  supports  it  with  the  dicta  of 
most  of  the  heavyweights  among  the  astronomers.  In  fact, 
throughout  the  whole  book  he  disarms  the  criticism  that  he 
is  no  astronomer  by  frankly  admitting  the  fact,  and  explaining 
that  whatever  he  may  state  upon  such  subjects  in  corrobora- 
tion of  his  views  he  invariably  quotes  from  astronomers  whose 
reputation  gives  them  a  right  to  be  considered.  Notwith- 
standing all  his  care,  however,  the  critics  who  disagree  with 


Wallace's  Great  Book  165 

his  conclusions,  have  quite  ignored  his  authorities  for  his 
astronomical  statements,  and  taken  them  as  originating  with 
the  author  himself. 

Wallace's  fourth  proposition  that  the  Earth  is  the  only 
planet  in  our  solar  system  that  is  habitable  is  easy  of  demon- 
stration. This,  in  fact,  is  now  accepted  by  practically  all 
astronomers  with  the  exception  of  my  friend  Professor  Lowell, 
who  clings  tenaciously  to  his  theory  that  Mars  is  inhabited. 
Its  small  size,  it  being  but  one-ninth  the  size  of  the  Earth, 
means,  however,  that  the  atmosphere,  if  Mars  has  any  at 
all  other  than  carbonic  acid  gas,  must  be  so  rare  that  the 
planet  cannot  retain  its  heat  by  night,  and,  therefore,  its 
surface  temperature,  during  the  greater  part  of  the  twenty- 
four  hours,  is  below  the  freezing  point,  which  of  course,  would 
hardly  be  favorable  to  life. 

Wallace  further  points  out  by  what  a  set  of  curious  coin- 
cidences the  Earth  is  habitable  for  man,  and  that  none  of  these 
conditions  exist  on  the  other  solar  planets,  and,  moreover,  are 
very  unlikely  to  exist  upon  the  planets,  if  any  such  exist,  of 
the  other  solar  systems.  All  this  is  so  contrary  to  the  ideas  of 
modern  men  of  science  that  there  has  naturally  been  raised 
a  wail  of  protest  that  is  more  pathetic  than  convincing. 

I  can  say  that  I,  for  one,  approached  Wallace's  book  with 
a  strong  belief  in  the  theory  that  there  were  very  likely 
millions  of  worlds  all  about  as  suitable  for  a  man  as  is  the 
Earth,  and  that  it  was  more  than  likely  that  several  millions 
of  these  worlds  were  inhabited  by  beings  not  only  equal  to 
man  but  probably  very  much  higher  in  development,  physically 
and  mentally.  Wallace,  however,  has  convinced  me  that  I 
was  wrong;  and  I  know  of  nothing  more  stimulating  to  the 
intellect  than  to  run  across  a  book  that  upsets  all  one's  pre- 
conceived ideas. 

Wallace  is  the  most  distinguished  scientist  of  the  age;  he 
is  the  co-discoverer  with  Darwin  of  the  theory  of  the  origin 
of  species,  and  it  is  only  through  his  great  modesty  that  he  is 
not  so  well  known  in  that  connection  as  is  Darwin.  He  is 
an  avowed  Socialist,  and  one  of  the  most  delightful  and  lovable 
men  it  has  ever  been  my  privilege  to  meet. 


166  Socialism  Inevitable 


HERBERT  SPENCER 

(February,   1904.) 

WE  are  all  too  apt  to  think,  when  a  man  does  not  agree 
with  us,  that  the  difference  of  opinion  rests  upon 
other  than  straightforward  reasons.  That  this  is 
a  fault  to  which  we  Socialists  are  prone  is  readily  admitted. 

But  we  have  more  cause  to  be  suspicious  than  most  people. 
It  is  not  to  the  interest  of  a  man  of  property  or  position  to 
agree  with  us,  and  since  the  economic  basis  of  Socialism  is  so 
plain  and  simple  we  have  a  good  reason  to  question  either 
the  brains  or  the  honesty  of  a  man  who  disagrees  with  us. 
Suppose  you  claim  the  right  and  title  to  four  apples,  and 
four  only.  Now  suppose  that  by  actual  count  I  show 
you  that  you  really  possess  five  apples.  I  then  say  you  have 
an  apple  to  which  you  have  no  right;  whereupon,  if  you  say, 
you  fail  to  understand  either  my  mathematics  or  my  ethics, 
I  can  justly  reply  by  questioning  your  sanity,  or  if  not  your 
sanity  your  honesty.  Now,  Socialism  to  a  Socialist  is  like 
unto  this  problem  of  the  four  apples  in  its  simplicity,  and  it 
is  always  hard  for  us  to  understand  that  it  is  not  just  as  plain 
to  others  as  it  is  to  us. 

Thus  Herbert  Spencer  has  always  been  a  conundrum  to  the 
Socialist.  Here  was  a  man,  one  of  the  foremost  thinkers 
of  the  day,  who  bowed  the  knee  neither  to  priest,  millionaire 
nor  king ;  a  man  who  preceded  Darwin  in  his  adherence  to  the" 
theory  of  evolution,  and  who  at  one  time  was  heading  straight 
for  Socialism. 

Spencer  was  apparently  logically  bound  to  apply  his  theory 
of  social  evolution  to  the  social  organization  of  man  as  well 
as  to  his  individual  organization.  If  man  was  developing, 
then  so  was  society.  He  had  said  that  the  "cardinal  trait  in 
all  advancing  organizations  is  the  development  of  the  regu- 
lative apparatus ;"  but  when  the  Trust  appeared  as  the  great 
regulator  of  industry,  and  a  fulfilment  of  his  prophecy,  he 
refused  to  recognize  it  as  such,  and    persisted  in  looking  at 


Spencer,  Herbert  167 

it  through  the  blind  and  prejudiced  eyes  of  an  American 
politician.  He  called  the  Trust  an  unnatural  phenomenon 
which  should  be  suppressed  by  the  police  powers  of  the  State. 
Then  whereas  some  fifty  years  ago  he  had  gone  so  far  aa  to 
demand  the  nationalization  of  land  as  a  necessary  concom- 
itant of  his  theories  of  exact  and  equal  justice,  he  later  on 
recanted,  lamely  excusing  himself  by  saying  that  it  was 
"simpler"  to  leave  the  existing  owners  in  possession  than  to 
take  the  trouble  of  expropriating  them. 

Of  course,  in  a  way,  he  was  right.  That  is,  if  we  are  to 
leave  all  private  capital,  except  land,  in  the  hands  of  private 
owners,  and  continue  with  our  present  competitive  system, 
it  is  hardly  worth  while  to  upset  things  for  the  little  good 
that  land  nationalization  would  do.  But  by  leaving  things 
as  they  are  we  give  up  all  our  ideas  of  exact  justice,  and  for 
a  man  with  the  high  ethical  standard  held  by  Herbert  Spencer 
his  recantation  was  incongruous  and  inexplicable. 

The  man  was  a  great  disappointment ;  but  this  is  not  saying 
that  he  has  not  performed  a  great  and  monumental  work  for 
humanity.  He  made  many  good  bricks,  and  even  if  they  do 
not  go  to  construct  the  building  he  designed,  they  have  come 
into  good  use  in  constructing  the  Socialist  edifice. 


168  Socialism  Inevitable 


THE  "RIGHT  TO  WORK" 

(March,   1904.) 

ON  no  subject  has  there  been  delivered  quite  so  much 
flapdoodle  as  on  the  so-called  "right  to  work."  The 
last  notable  deliverance  on  the  subject  was  that  of 
Jas.  M.  Beck,  ex-Assistant  Attorney  General  of  the  United 
States,  at  the  annual  dinner  of  the  Holland  Society  in  New 
York.  Mr.  Beck,  in  the  course  of  his  speech,  thus  unbur- 
dened himself: 

If  I  do  not  misread  history,  the  prosperity  of  the  Dutch  people 
was  founded  upon  a  principle  which  is  vitally  essential  to  the 
progress  and  happiness  of  any  people,  and  that  is  the  inalienable 
right  of  every  man  to  work  for  whom  he  pleases  and  at  what 
wage  he  pleases,  and  to  enjoy  freely  the  fruit  of  his  toil.  This 
principle  is  in  some  need  of  vindication  in  this  country  and  at 
this  hour.  Man  was  brought  into  the  world  to  work.  It  is  not 
only  his  burden,  it  is  his  right,  and  any  form  of  social  tyranny 
which  contravenes  this  right  is  infinitely  mischievous.  In  vain 
are  written  constitutions,  with  their  paper  guarantee  of  life, 
liberty  and  pursuit  of  happiness,  if  the  right  of  the  humblest 
citizen  to  earn  his  bread  in  the  sweat  of  his  brow  is  thus  denied. 

Mr.  Beck  reveals  the  same  queer  mental  twist  that  in- 
variably characterizes  the  Trust  attorney,  or  such  others  as  are 
moved  to  "bend  the  pregnant  hinges  of  the  knee,  that  thrift 
may  follow  fawning."  There  is  no  record  that  any  of  these 
twisted  reasoners  have  answered  the  question,  why,  if  it  is 
"the  inalienable  right  of  every  man  to  work  for  whom  he 
pleases  and  at  what  wage  he  pleases,"  is  the  constantly  in- 
creasing army  of  unemployed  forced  to  go  hungry  for  lack  of 
opportunity  to  exercise  this  "inalienable  right"?  As  Mr. 
Beck,  and  those  like  him,  interpret  the  doctrine  of  the  "in- 
alienable right  to  work,"  the  theory  is  sheer  nonsense,  and 
simply  a  perversion  of  the  theoretically  admitted  right  of 
every  man  to  life,  which,  of  course,  he  cannot  enjoy  without 
work.  Mr.  Beck,  and  those  of  his  kind  seem  to  be  very  in- 
dignant when  they  talk  about  somebody  being  denied  the 


The  "Right  to  Work"  169 

right  to  work,  but  of  course  all  their  clamor  is  simply  due 
to  the  fact  that  they  want  unrestricted  competition  in  the 
labor  market.  They  don't  want  any  labor  organization  trying 
to  control  it,  since  this  would  mean  that  Mr.  Beck  or  his 
employers  would  have  to  pay  higher  wages,  whereas  if  the 
power  of  the  labor  unions  were  crushed,  the  capitalists  could 
get  labor  on  their  own  terms  and  conditions.  There  we  have 
the  milk  in  the  cocoanut. 


170  Socialism  Inevitable 


WILSHIRE'S  EXILE  TO  END 

(April,    1904.) 

WILSHIKE'S  MAGAZINE  is  edited  in  New  York 
but  published  in  Canada.  This  anomaly,  however, 
is  going  to  end,  as  we  have  just  received  the  gra- 
cious intimation  from  His  Imperial  Highness,  President 
Eoosevelt,  conveyed  through  his  Third  Assistant  Postmaster 
General,  Mr.  Madden,  that  he  has  decided,  in  his  infinite 
wisdom  and  goodness,  to  allow  me  to  print  again  in  New  York. 
If  s  very  good  of  the  Strenuous  One  to  allow  a  Socialist  devil 
like  Wilshire  to  ink  his  editorial  sheets  in  the  same  city  where 
he  thinks  his  thinks,  but  that  the  approaching  November  elec- 
tion has  had  anything  to  do  with  this  awakening  of  his  con- 
science is,  of  course,  not  to  be  mentioned.  The  President  had 
to  have  time  to  consider,  that's  all. 

Now,  although  I  do  not  wish  to  weary  my  readers  with 
my  tale  of  woe,  it  will  be  necessary  to  give  a  brief  outline  for 
the  benefit  of  those  who  desire  to  know  the  facts.  Let  the 
others  be  patient  while  I  groan. 

In  December,  1900,  I  began  to  publish  this  magazine — or 
rather  its  weekly  predecessor,  The  Challenge — in  Los  Angeles, 
but  as  things  soon  began  to  boom,  I  decided  that  New  York 
would  be  a  better  field  from  which  to  enlighten  the  dear 
public.  Accordingly  I  moved  my  printing  office  from  Los 
Angeles  and  issued  the  first  number  in  New  York  in  Sep- 
tember, 1901.  I  had,  of  course,  secured  second  class  mailing 
rates  in  California,  and  took  for  granted  that  there  would 
be  no  difficulty  in  getting  the  necessary  transfer.  Indeed 
I  think  this  would  readily  have  been  issued  had  it  not  been 
for  the  unfortunate  assassination  of  President  McKinley, 
which  occurred  the  very  week  in  which  my  application  was 
made.  This  may  have  been  simply  a  coincidence,  but  if  so, 
it  was  a  very  remarkable  one,  for  a  hue  and  cry  had  arisen 
throughout  the  nation  that  this  crime  was  the  result  of  the 
pernicious  teaching  of  the  Socialists  and  Anarchists,  and  that 


Wilshire's  Exile  to  End  171 

all  papers  advocating  such  doctrines  should  be  suppressed. 
At  that  time  a  good  many  people  did  not  distinguish  between 
Socialism  and  Anarchism,  and  it  looked  to  me  as  if  the  post- 
office  thought  that  it  would  be  a  good  opportunity  to  injure 
the  cause  of  Socialism  by  suppressing  this,  a  Socialist  maga- 
zine.   Anyway,  they  refused  the  transfer. 

The  postoffice  authorities  have  always  denied  such  a  motive. 
They  claim  that  the  paper  was  suppressed  not  on  account  of 
its  Socialistic  views,  but  because  of  its  Wilshire  views.  Its 
views,  in  fact,  were  so  Wilshiresque  that  the  magazine  in  their 
eyes  was  simply  an  advertising  circular  for  the  spread  of 
Wilshire  ideas,  and,  as  such,  had  no  right  to  newspaper  postal 
rates  but  must  pay  "advertising  circular"  rates. 

When  I  say  "suppressed"  a  word  of  explanation  is  neces- 
sary. The  paper  was  not  actually  suppressed,  but  its  rate  of 
postage  was  raised  from  one  cent  a  pound  to  eight  cents  a 
pound,  which  was  really  equivalent  to  suppression,  inasmuch 
as  the  postage  cost  at  the  eight-cent  rate  was  practically  pro- 
hibitory. 

I  tried  to  have  the  decision  reversed,  but  all  effort  was 
unavailing.  I  appealed  to  the  President.  He  refused  either 
to  see  me  or  to  take  up  my  case,  and  my  letters  to  him  com- 
plaining of  Mr.  Madden's  act  were  turned  over  to  Mr.  Madden 
himself  to  answer.  This  was  probably  as  insulting  a  way  of 
denying  a  citizen  the  right  of  petition  as  even  strenuosity 
could  devise.  I  next  went  to  the  United  States  Courts,  but 
obtaining  justice  that  way  is  too  long-winded  a  procedure 
for  a  monthly  magazine.  Indeed,  my  case  is  yet  pending,  hav- 
ing never  even  come  to  trial. 

After  thus  exhausting  every  device  I  could  think  of,  I 
finally  appealed  to  the  Postmaster  General  of  Canada,  and 
asked  him  if  he  would  give  me  second  class  entry  there.  He 
promptly  decided  that  Wilshire's  Magazine  was  eligible 
to  entry,  even  when  I  carefully  explained  to  him  that  Mr. 
Madden  had  declared  it  to  be  merely  a  circular  to  advertise 
Wilshire's  ideas.  However,  the  Canadian  law  requires  that 
a  periodical  taking  advantage  of  second  class  entry  at  the 
Canadian  postoffice  must  be  printed  in  Canada.  So  I  hied 
myself  across  the  border  and  issued  my  first  Canadian  num- 
ber in  January,  1902.    My  editorial  and  publishing  offices 


172  Socialism  Inevitable 

remain  in  New  York,  but  the  printing  and  mailing  are  yet 
done  in  Toronto. 

I  might  mention  that  just  prior  to  my  going  to  Canada  a 
certain  Mr.  Harrison  J.  Barrett,  an  attorney  of  Baltimore 
— a  nephew  of  Judge  Tyner,  the  recently  deposed  Attorney 
General  of  the  postoffice — offered  to  take  up  the  case  and 
obtain  my  entry  in  New  York  for  the  modest  fee  of  $5,000. 
Mr.  Barrett,  I  may  add,  has  since  been  disbarred  for  connec- 
tion with  the  postoffice  frauds.  I  declined  to  be  bled,  how- 
ever, and  for  more  than  two  years  have  had  the  unique 
distinction  of  thinking  in  New  York  and  printing  my  thinks 
in  Canada. 

All  this  time,  of  course,  I  have  been  trying  to  get  back, 
but  hitherto  without  success.  Although  I  called  the  attention 
of  all  the  Congressmen  to  the  matter,  never  a  one  budged  to 
help  me.  My  plea  was  made  upon  the  general  ground  of 
the  freedom  of  the  press,  but  that  was  simply  a  question  of 
principle,  and  who  bothers  about  principles  these  days  ?  Then 
I  found  the  right  path :  I  tried  business.  A  certain  printer 
in  New  York,  not  knowing  of  my  enforced  exile,  came  to 
me  and  solicited  the  job  of  printing  the  magazine.  I  said 
I  would  be  glad  to  consider  his  bid  if  he  could  arrange  that 
the  New  York  postoffice  would  allow  me  second  class  entry. 
Mr.  Printer  promptly  wrote  to  Senator  Tom  Piatt  of  New 
York.  He  complained  of  the  gross  injustice  done  to  the 
printing  trade  of  New  York  in  forcing  me  to  give  out  work 
to  Canada  which  should  be  kept  at  home.  Could  Senator 
Piatt  not  rectify  such  an  outrage? 

"Well,  I  guess  I  can,"  said  the  Senator.  "What  am  I  here 
for  except  to  look  after  my  constituents  and  see  that  they 
can  have  every  opportunity  to  make  a  living?" 

That  was  all.  In  short  order  I  had  a  most  polite  letter 
from  Mr.  Madden  saying  that  anything  he  could  do  for  me 
to  help  me  back  to  New  York  would  be  done  instanter.  As 
a  preliminary  he  granted  me  the  right  of  "foreign  entry," 
which  means  that  he  has  decided  that  the  magazine  is  all 
right  as  now  printed  in  a  foreign  country — Canada — and  is 
a  tacit  admission  from  him  that  if  it  is  printed  in  New  York 
I  will  be  granted  entry  there. 

So  good-by,  dear  Canada.  I  have  many  pleasant  recollec- 
tions of  you.     You  have  treated  me  much  better  than  my 


Wilshiue's  Exile  to  End  173 

own  country  ever  did.  I  shall  never  forget  how  you  sheltered 
me,  a  poor  exile.  I  would  stay  with  you  longer,  were  it  not 
so  troublesome,  this  sending  manuscript  to  and  fro  between 
New  York  and  Toronto.  I  may  have  to  print  my  next  number 
in  Toronto,  but  after  that  I  shall  remain  in  New  York  unless 
Mr.  Madden  decides  that  I  have  again  become  too  gay.  Leave 
your  latch-string  out,  Dear  Lady  of  the  Snows. 


174  Socialism  Inevitable 


BRYAN  WILL  DISCUSS  SOCIALISM 

(April,    1904.) 

WHEN  we  say  that  Bryan  will  discuss  Socialism  we 
must  hasten  to  add  that  there  is  a  saving  clause  to 
this  announcement,  for  the  discussion  is  to  be  in 
"due  time."  He  probably  means  that  he  will  discuss  Social- 
ism when  Socialism  is  due. 

We  gather  this  information  from  a  Sandusky,  Ohio,  paper. 
Thomas  H.  Cowens,  a  prominent  and  wealthy  Sandusky 
young  man,  and  an  ardent  Socialist  who  takes  great  interest 
in  the  questions  of  the  day,  recently  wrote  to  Bryan,  asking 
him  whether  it  was  true  that  he  refused  to  debate  with  Gay- 
lord  Wilshire.    Bryan  replied: 

I  will  say  that  it  is  true  that  I  refused  to  debate  with  Mr. 
Wilshire,  as  I  have  refused  to  debate  with  a  great  many  others. 
Answering  your  other  questions,  I  beg  to  say  that  the  question 
of  Socialism  will  be  discussed  in  due  time,  but  I  do  not  accept 
the  theory  that  the  Trust  is  an  economic  evolution. 

Mr.  Bryan  enclosed  a  cartoon  from  his  paper,  the  Com- 
moner, which  he  says  is  an  illustration  of  the  "manner  in 
which  the  water  is  being  squeezed  out  of  the  trusts,"  and 
adds  that  "this  would  indicate  that  they  are  anything  but 
natural  or  legitimate." 

In  the  above  Mr.  Bryan  at  last  admits  that  he  refused  to 
debate  with  Mr.  Wilshire.  This  is  the  first  time  we  ever 
knew  he  would  even  admit  having  received  the  challenge. 
We  know  that  it  is  wearisome  debating  with  every  obscure 
crank  who  comes  trotting  down  the  pike,  wishing  to  gain 
notoriety  by  mere  association  with  a  great  man,  and  so  heart- 
ily sympathize  with  Mr.  Bryan's  disinclination  to  accept  such 
challenges. 

But  Wilshire's  challenge  was  not  exactly  of  the  ordinary 
variety.  There  was  money  to  be  paid  to  Mr.  Bryan  for 
wearying  himself,  if  talking  can  be  said  to  weary  W.  J.  Mr. 
Wilshire,  in  short,  offered  him  $10,000  for  a  short,  but  pain- 


Bryan  Will  Discuss  Socialism  175 

ful,  two  hours  of  his  time,  and  put  up  a  large  cash  deposit 
with  Mr.  Bryan's  friend,  Editor  W.  R.  Hearst,  as  a  guarantee 
of  good  faith  upon  his,  Wilshire's  part,  so  that  there  could  be 
no  doubt  that  the  money  would  be  forthcoming  if  Mr.  Bryan 
would  accept  the  challenge.  Mr.  Bryan  simply  paid  no  at- 
tention whatsoever  to  the  challenge  though  it  was  made  in 
such  a  way  that  he  could  accept  the  money  either  in  his 
capacity  as  a  speaker  or  as  a  lawyer. 

However,  when  it  appears  that  even  at  this  belated  hour 
Mr.  Bryan  does  not  yet  accept  the  theory  that  trusts  are  a 
result  of  economic  evolution,  and  as  evidence  of  the  soundness 
of  his  views  we  see  that  he  refers  to  the  falling  value  of  trust 
stocks,  it  is  not  difficult  for  us  to  determine  why  Mr.  Bryan 
refuses  to  debate  the  Trust  Problem.  He  knows  nothing 
about  trusts,  he  knows  nothing  about  "economic  evolution," 
and  knowing  enough  to  know  that  he  doesn't  know,  he  is 
wise  enough  to  do  all  he  can  to  keep  the  public  dark  as  to 
his  ignorance.  It  is  worth  a  good  deal  more  than  ten  thousand 
dollars  to  Mr.  Bryan  to  prevent  the  world  from  suspecting 
how  much  he  doesn't  know.  A  debate  would  lift  the  cover  oft 
his  brain  and  let  us  see  what  a  yawning  vacuum  exists  there. 
It's  both  money  and  fame  to  him  to  prevent  a  call  that  will 
show  what  a  bluff  he  makes  in  pretending  he  has  gray  matter 
to  burn.  The  squeezing  of  water  out  of  Trust  stocks  means 
nothing  at  all.  When  the  Steel  Trust  or  the  Oil  Trust 
or  the  Sugar  Trust  disintegrates  and  resolves  itself  into  its 
component  parts,  and  these  parts  once  again  compete  with 
each  other,  then  will  we  admit  that  the  trusts  are  not  the 
result  of  economic  evolution.  In  the  meantime  we  maintain 
that  the  Steel  Trust  is  just  as  much  a  monopoly  to-day,  with 
its  shares  selling  at  ten  dollars,  as  it  was  a  monopoly  last 
summer,  when  its  shares  sold  at  forty  dollars. 

It  is  the  dividends  that  determine  the  stock  values,  and  it 
is  the  centralization  of  industry  that  determines  monopoly. 


176  Socialism  Inevitable 


HOW  WE  WILL  DIVIDE 

(April,  1904.) 

THE  standard  of  value  in  an  industrial  society  can  be 
determined  by  the  labor  time  required  to  make  the 
article.  Under  Socialism  it  is  improbable  that  there 
will  be  any  difference  in  the  valuation  of  one  man's  time 
over  that  of  another.  In  the  first  place,  everyone  will  be 
educated  and  fitted  to  do  what  he  is  capable  of  doing.  To-day 
there  is  many  a  man  who  might  have  been  a  good  doctor  or 
lawyer  or  artist,  but,  owing  to  poverty,  could  not  educate 
himself,  and  so  is  merely  a  common  laborer. 

Under  Socialism  a  man  can  always  develop  the  best  that 
is  within  him,  and  the  system  of  education  will  be  such  that 
it  will  be  developed.  Instead  of  men  being  divided  into  hod- 
carriers  and  musicians,  it  is  the  labor,  not  the  laborers,  that 
will  be  divided.  A  man  can  have  his  life  so  ordered  that  he 
may  have  all  his  faculties,  mental,  physical  and  spiritual,  de- 
veloped by  the  exercise  of  his  daily  work.  There  is  many  a 
professional  man  to-day  whose  brain  would  be  stronger,  his 
health  better,  and  his  life  longer  if  he  had  the  opportunity  to 
perform  some  useful  outdoor  work.  He  probably  knows  it 
too,  and  desires  it,  but  the  conditions  of  our  competitive  sys- 
tem are  such  that  it  is  practically  impossible  for  him  to  com- 
bine the  two  lives,  the  physical  and  the  mental.  As  for  the 
hod-carrier  of  to-day  trying  to  exercise  his  brain  and  soul 
by  painting  a  few  Madonnas  or  composing  a  Ninth  Symphony, 
the  mere  mention  of  the  idea  conveys  its  absurdity. 

Under  Socialism  work  will  be  so  varied,  so  pleasant  and 
so  light  that  it  will  be  done  as  a  pleasure  and  not  as  a  task. 
Then  men  will  feel  that  work  is  just  as  much  a  necessity  of 
their  life  as  for  the  heart  to  pump  blood.  Does  your  heart 
ask  pay  for  beating?  Man  in  a  natural  state  will  ask  for 
nothing  better  than  the  opportunity  to  work.  A  bee  or  an 
ant  finds  no  greater  pleasure  in  life  than  to  work,  and  man, 
after  all,  is  simply  an  animal  with  a  soul.    Work  is  life. 


How  We  Will  Divide  177 

Hence,  under  Socialism  the  idea  of  work  as  a  task  to  be 
avoided  will  be  as  absurd  as  that  of  a  honey-bee  unwillingly 
flitting  from  flower  to  flower  to  gather  the  required  amount 
of  honey,  and  wishing  all  the  time  that  it  might  spend  its 
days  in  idleness. 

All  this  may  sound  too  dreamy  for  the  man  who  is  so  pre- 
judiced as  a  result  of  his  present  environment  that  he  cannot 
imagine  how  men  would  act  in  another  state.  He  cannot 
conceive  that  when  we  have  Socialism  the  scramble  will  be 
for  the  privilege  of  working;  not  for  the  privilege  of  taking. 
In  other  words,  the  fun  will  be  more  in  the  making  of  the 
pudding  than  in  the  eating  of  it.  These  people  who  are 
worrying  so  much  about  how  they  are  going  to  divide  up 
the  omelette  before  they  find  the  eggs  to  make  it  with,  should 
remember  that  to-day  they  at  best  can  only  get  the  egg  shells, 
and  that  they  can't  run  much  risk  by  adopting  a  plan  which 
promises  them  the  eggs.  To-day  we  do  not  profess  to  give 
products  according  as  a  man  has  produced.  We  simply  hand 
the  eggs  over  to  the  capitalist  and  stand  on  our  hind  legs 
begging  and  whining  for  the  shells.  When  it  amuses  him  to 
toss  them  to  us  we  gratefully  wag  our  little  tails.  Under 
Socialism  we  would  have  a  system  organized  for  the  benefit  of 
the  workers,  not  for  the  drones. 

The  theory  is  amusing  that  Socialism  by  enforcing  economy 
will  cut  off  the  demand  for  luxuries,  so  that  a  man  will  be 
compelled  to  wear  a  home-spun  suit,  eat  oat-meal,  drink  water, 
stop  smoking,  and  buy  only  of  the  state  store.  Under  Social- 
ism, on  the  contrary,  a  man  will  get  what  he  produces.  If 
he  wants  champagne,  cigars,  automobiles,  diamonds,  etc., 
nobody  will  object  either  to  the  wish  or  its  realization,  on  con- 
dition that  he  gives  his  labor  in  exchange  for  the  labor  which 
produces  what  he  gets.  For  instance,  if  he  wants  a  pink  pearl 
ground  up  in  his  coffee  every  morning,  then  he  will  either 
have  to  fish  for  the  pearl  himself  or  give  up  his  labor  to  the 
chap  who  does  it  for  him.  Now,  as  pearls  are  not  found  in 
every  oyster,  and  it  takes,  say,  a  week's  hard  and  dangerous 
labor  to  get  one  pearl,  it  means  that  the  man  with  a  penchant 
for  drinking  ground  pearls  would  have  to  work  a  week  to  pay 
for  one  drink.  Probably  after  a  few  such  drinks,  he  would 
decide  of  his  own  accord  to  give  up  his  extravagant  taste. 

Under  Socialism  the  ordinary  worker's  income  will  be  aug- 


178  Socialism  Inevitable 

mented  to  many  times  its  present  size,  and  he  will  spend  it 
as  he  pleases.  It  will  not  be  so  very  different  from  what 
would  happen  to  the  man  who  is  now  getting  two  dollars  a 
day  and  should  receive  a  sudden  raise  to  twenty  dollars.  The 
usual  thing  to-day  is  that  he  promptly  raises  his  standard  of 
living  to  correspond  to  his  larger  income.  He  could,  if  he 
chose,  work  only  one-tenth  of  the  time,  but  he  rarely  makes 
such  a  choice.  He  will  prefer  to  stop  living  at  cheap  restau- 
rants and  patronize  better  ones.  And  it  will  be  the  same 
under  Socialism — exactly  the  same.  Man  will  have  more  and 
he  will  spend  more.  Supply  will  increase  and  to  equalize 
things,  with  the  increased  supply  will  come  an  increased  de- 
mand. 

Private  business  under  Socialism  will  not  necessarily  be 
wiped  out.  I  may  like  a  peculiar  brand  of  wine  or  an  odd 
kind  of  cheese,  or  rag-time  music.  The  state  may  not  bother 
to  furnish  me  with  such  things.  Do  I  lose  them?  Not 
much.  I  have  plenty  of  money — Socialist  money — and  I  use 
it  to  pay  the  maker  of  my  peculiar  wine,  my  cheese,  my  music. 
I  am  satisfied,  for  I  get  what  I  want.  The  producer  is  sat- 
isfied, for  he  gets  his  pay  for  the  kind  of  work  that  he 
chooses  to  do.  Again,  if  I  want  merely  pure  water,  the  state 
will  be  pretty  sure  to  be  in  a  position  to  give  it  to  me  for  a 
reasonable  payment  in  Socialist  money — time  checks  earned 
by  my  work.  This  work  may  be  in  the  state  water  works,  or 
it  may  be  singing  rag-time  music  for  Jones,  who  has  given  me 
his  time  checks  which  he  may  have  earned  working  in  the 
city  gas  works. 

The  time-clock  system,  therefore,  offers  a  simple  mechanical 
method  for  determining  what  each  man  should  get.  But  that 
we  shall  ever  use  any  such  a  system  for  any  great  length  of 
time  I  hardly  believe.  Your  heart  doesn't  wake  you  up  in 
the  morning  by  a  knock  on  your  ribs  and  demand  pay  for  the 
work  it  did  while  you  slept.  If  you  had  to  busy  yourself  de- 
termining exactly  how  much  blood  you  should  give  to  each  of 
your  organs  every  day  according  to  the  work  that  organ  did 
for  you,  your  life  would  indeed  be  a  burden.  It  would  be  less 
wearisome  for  you  to  say  "grab  what  you  can  and  let  the 
slow  grabber  starve." 


Good  Old  Rockefeller  179 


GOOD  OLD  ROCKEFELLER 

(July,   1904.) 

ONE  of  the  most  fortunate  occurrences  that  could  happen 
for  Socialism  is  that  the  man  who  has  most  profited  by 
the  existing  competitive  system  is  one  who  so  strictly 
conforms  to  the  conventional  ideas  of  religion  and  morality.  If 
Mr.  Kockefeller  were  noted  for  his  profligacy  or  for  his  viola- 
tion of  the  ordinary  business  rules  of  life  we  might  be  able  to 
blame  the  individual  rather  than  the  system ;  but  as  a  matter 
of  fact  even  the  most  searching  scrutiny  into  his  methods, 
which  is  being  given  by  Miss  Tarbell  in  McClure's  Magazine, 
discloses  no  such  moral  or  legal  delinquency  as  so  many  other 
of  our  great  capitalists  are  guilty  of. 

Miss  TarbelPs  story  of  Rockefeller,  which  is  continued  in 
last  month's  McClure's,  is  simply  a  long  recital  of  the  attempt 
of  the  various  refiners  and  producers  of  oil  to  keep  up  an 
independent  existence.  She  says  that  up  to  1887  Mr.  Eocke- 
feller had  confined  his  attention  to  the  refining  of  oil,  and 
had  not  gone  into  the  production  of  the  raw  material.  In 
that  year,  for  the  first  time,  he  was  compelled  to  purchase  oil 
bearing  lands,  inasmuch  as  the  oil  producers  were  forming 
a  monopoly  which  threatened  to  cut  him  off  from  his  supply 
of  crude  oil.  Oil  had  always  been  at  such  a  very  low  price, 
owing  to  over-production,  that  there  had  been  no  reason  for 
Rockefeller  himself  producing  it. 

Of  course  there  were  many  and  grievous  complaints  about 
the  low  prices,  for  which  Eockefeller  was  held  responsible. 
Examined  upon  this  point  by  an  investigating  committee,  he 
replied :  "The  dear  people,  if  they  had  produced  less  oil  than 
they  require,  we  would  have  given  their  full  price;  no  com- 
bination in  the  world  could  have  prevented  that,  if  they  had 
produced  less  oil  than  the  world  requires."  That  this  is  true 
can  be  seen  from  the  fact  that  the  yearly  production  of 
crude  oil  had  risen  from  Hvq  and  a  half  to  thirty  million 


180  Socialism  Inevitable 

barrels,  and  in  1883  thirty-five  million  were  above  ground  in 
stock. 

Now  Mr.  Kockefeller  could  not  be  blamed  for  this  great 
surplus,  inasmuch  as  he  had  nothing  to  do  with  its  production. 
It  is  true  that  he  did  limit  the  distribution  to  a  certain  ex- 
tent by  putting  up  the  price  of  his  refined  oil,  but  even  if  he 
had  sold  at  absolute  cost  there  would  still  have  been  over- 
production. The  lowering  of  the  price  a  few  cents  a  gallon 
would  have  undoubtedly  stimulated  the  demand  for  oil,  but 
not  nearly  enough  to  have  absorbed  the  total  production. 
The  earth  has  in  its  oil  fields  a  great  deal  more  oil  than 
people  can  burn  up  this  year;  but  the  oil  producers  do  not 
seem  to  think  so,  clinging  rather  to  the  idea  that  all  they  have 
to  do  to  use  up  the  earth's  store  for  the  ages  is  simply  to 
reduce  the  price. 

But  not  only  can  the  earth  yield  a  great  deal  more  than 
can  possibly  be  consumed;  but  our  competitive  system  pre- 
vents people  from  having  means  enough  to  buy  what  they 
want ;  so  that  there  are  two  very  good  reasons,  either  of  which 
is  quite  sufficient  to  account  for  overproduction.  Mr.  Kocke- 
feller, it  is  true,  has  been  absolutely  relentless  in  his  deter- 
mination to  prevent  and  exterminate  competition  in  the  oil 
business,  but  that  he  has  done  anything  that  an  ordinary 
business  man  would  not  do  under  similar  circumstances  to 
beat  a  competitor,  is  not  very  clear.  The  great  difference  be- 
tween Mr.  Kockefeller  and  other  men,  is  that  he  has  had 
the  courage  and  ability  to  resort  to  such  measures. 

It  must  be  admitted,  however,  that  Wilshire's  Magazine 
is  rather  a  prejudiced  witness  in  favor  of  Mr.  Kockefeller, 
inasmuch  as  we  are  endeavoring  to  show  that  the  fault,  exists 
not  in  the  individual  but  in  the  system.  We  are  of  the  opin- 
ion, moreover,  that  the  day  is  not  far  distant  when  McClure's 
Magazine  will  also  come  to  the  same  opinion.  Their  brilliant 
contributor,  Lincoln  Steffens,  does  not  hesitate  to  declare  that 
the  source  of  corruption  exists,  not  in  the  innate  wickedness 
of  man,  but  in  the  innate  wickedness  of  the  competitive  sys- 
tem under  which  man  labors.  In  this,  at  least,  we  are  fully 
agreed. 


Bkxan  Explains  Socialism  181 


BRYAN  EXPLAINS  SOCIALISM 

(July,  1904.) 

ME.  BRYAN*  has  at  last  been  driven  from  cover  by  the 
attacks  of  the  Chicago  Chronicle,  denouncing  him  as 
a  Socialist.  He  has  a  long  editorial  in  the  last  Com~ 
moner,  in  which  he  explains  why  he  is  not  a  Socialist.  He  ad- 
mits that  he  has  come  to  the  conclusion  that  monopoly  in 
railroads,  telephones  and  telegraphs  has  come  to  stay,  and  that, 
therefore,  it  is  better  to  have  public  ownership  than  private 
monopoly.  But  he  is  not  prepared  to  admit  that  there  is  any 
economic  necessity  for  trusts  in  the  manufacture  of  cotton  and 
woolen  goods,  or  whiskey,  oil,  tobacco,  etc.  He  says :  "These 
trusts  are  organized  not  because  of  any  economic  necessity, 
but  for  the  purpose  of  destroying  competition." 

The  question  I  would  like  to  put  to  Mr.  Bryan  is  this :  If 
it  becomes  an  economic  necessity  to  destroy  competition,  is 
not  then  the  Trust  an  economic  necessity?  Mr.  Bryan  does 
not  understand  that  the  accumulation  of  surplus  capital  in 
this  country,  which  has  hitherto  been  poured  into  the  build- 
ing of  productive  machinery,  has  finally  become  very  much 
greater  than  any  economic  demand.  Hence,  overproduction 
has  ensued,  and  overproduction  means  cut-throat  competition, 
and  cut-throat  competition  means  bankruptcy  unless  it  is 
prevented.  If  Mr.  Bryan  could  only  understand  that  the 
Trust  is  an  absolute  economic  necessity  to  prevent  over- 
production, we  would  have  him  right  in  line  in  seeing  the 
necessity  of  the  Trust ;  and  once  recognizing  the  necessity  of 
the  Trust  in  manufacturing  enterprises,  he  will  be  compelled 
to  conclude  with  the  Socialists  that  such  monopolies  along 
with  railroad  monopolies  should  be  nationalized. 

Mr.  Bryan  is  moving,  but  moving  slowly.  He  says  he 
now  sees  that  the  borrower  is  not  on  the  same  footing  as  the 
lender;  therefore  he  favors  limiting  the  rate  of  interest.  He 
sees  that  the  employee  is  not  on  the  same  footing  as  the 
employer,  therefore  he  favors  the  limitation  of  the  hours  of 


182  Socialism  Inevitable 

labor,  and  the  prevention  of  the  employment  of  children. 
These  are  great  steps  in  advance  for  Mr.  Bryan,  who,  only  a 
few  years  ago,  was  declaring  for  free  trade  in  everything, 
labor  as  well  as  silver.  He  belonged,  in  fact,  to  the  old  Adam 
Smith  school  of  laissez-faire  economists.  However,  now  that 
he  sees  that  the  employee  is  not  on  a  footing  with  the  em- 
ployer, and  is  endeavoring  to  place  him  more  on  an  equality, 
we  would  like  to  ask  him  if  the  best  way  to  accomplish  this 
would  not  be  to  put  him  on  an  equality  of  wealth.  This  is 
what  public  ownership  of  the  means  of  production  would  do. 
It  is  a  pity  that  Bryan  does  not  understand  his  economics 
better  than  he  does,  as  there  is  no  one  in  the  country  who 
has  a  better  opportunity  of  getting  his  views  heard. 


The  Steikees  and  the  Meat  Tbust  183 


THE  STRIKERS  AND  THE  MEAT  TRUST 

(August,  1904.) 


THE  strike  of  the  Meat  Trust's  employees,  and  the  conse- 
quent alarming  and  almost  prohibitive  rise  in  the  price 
of  meat  throughout  the  country,  is  a  very  clear  illustra- 
tion of  the  danger  into  which  the  trusts  are  dragging  us.  When 
a  few  men  can  prohibit  the  nation  from  eating  meat,  and  a  few 
others  can  prohibit  us  from  eating  bread,  we  are  not  far  off 
from  a  much  more  effective  despotism  than  Nero  ever  con- 
ceived. 

That  the  workers  on  strike  have  a  most  just  cause  is  ad- 
mitted by  any  impartial  observer.  The  following,  written  by 
Joseph  Wanhope,  who  is  perfectly  familiar  with  the  dreadful 
conditions  of  the  trade  in  Chicago,  will  give  the  reader  some 
idea  of  the  conditions  prevailing : 

It  is  a  strike  against  a  reduction  of  wages,  involving  a  cent 
per  hour,  but  so  narrow  is  the  margin  on  which  these  hunger- 
tortured  wretches  exist,  that  the  difference  of  a  cent  probably 
means  life  or  death  to  them.  At  any  rate,  it  was  the  last  straw. 
They  are  now  out,  and  the  contest  between  empty  stomachs  and 
the  capitalists'  dollar  is  on. 

Few  people  have  any  idea  of  the  indescribable  wretchedness 
in  which  these  Chicago  workers  live.  Right  under  the  walls  of 
the  district,  where  perhaps  more  food  is  stored  than  on  any 
other  spot  of  a  similar  size  on  earth,  the  children  of  the  un- 
skilled workers  precariously  employed  in  the  monster  packing 
houses,  may  be  seen  standing  at  the  gates  begging  for  the  scraps 
of  food  that  might  be  left  in  the  dinner-pails  of  the  better-paid 
workingmen.  The  district  in  which  these  unfortunates  live  is 
known  in  Chicago  parlance  as  "back  of  the  dump,"  a  spot  several 
acres  in  extent  covered  with  the  reeking  garbage  of  the  great 
city,  and  mixing  its  fetid  odors  with  the  ever-present  stock-yard 
stench.  Unpaved  streets,  with  unfathomable  mud-holes,  dilap- 
idated and  unsanitary  hovels,  cheap  saloons  and  gorgeous 
churches,  most  of  the  latter  subsidized  by  the  packers,  abound. 
Politically,  the  district  belongs  to  one  Carey,  a  saloon-keeping 
alderman,  who  is  hand  in  glove  with  the  packers,  the  clergy  and 
the  thugs  of  the  neighborhood,  and  whose  political  agents,  locally 


184  Socialism  Inevitable 

known  as  "Carey's  Indians,"  serve  to  keep  the  "boss"  in  power 
as  agent  for  the  packers,  and  terrorize  any  intruders  who  would 
poach  on  his  political  domain. 

In  this  dreary  and  hideous  district,  the  light  of  Socialism  has 
never  yet  penetrated.  Years  of  work  and  effort  by  the  local  com- 
rades have  failed  to  secure  a  foothold  there.  And  the  inhabitants 
of  this  region,  starved  in  body,  stunted  in  mind,  a  combination 
of  slavery,  brutality  and  ignorance,  in  about  equal  proportions, 
have  at  last  rebelled,  and  are  now  ready  to  give  what  battle 
they  can  to  their  pious  exploiters. 

The  outcome  will  be  interesting,  though  there  is  little  doubt 
but  that  these  wretched  people  will  be  crushed  back  in  sullen 
despair  into  their  hideous  dens,  after  an  exhibition  of  "lawless- 
ness" that  will  afford  the  capitalists  all  the  excuse  they  need 
for  "taking  vigorous  measures  for  their  repression,"  and  for 
the  maintenance  of  "law  and  order." 

But  that  they  have  rebelled  at  all  is  a  hopeful  sign.  It  may 
give  the  Socialists  the  long-desired  opportunity  to  teach  the  only 
way  out  of  the  festering  mass  of  misery  and  want  that  exists 
under  the  shadow  of  a  mighty  food  reservoir,  of  which  it  is 
boasted  that  the  armies  of  Europe  must  first  make  application 
before  they  can  march,  and  which  sends  provisions  by  the 
millions  of  pounds  to  the  uttermost  ends  of  the  earth.  Whatever 
the  intellectual  capacity  of  these  suffering  people  may  be,  there 
is  no  doubt,  however,  that  the  Chicago  stock-yards  furnishes  an 
indictment  against  the  damnable  system  of  capitalism  that  can- 
not be  paralleled  elsewhere  on  the  face  of  the  earth. 

Fundamentally,  of  course,  the  question  whether  the  strik- 
ers are  right  or  wrong  is  of  much  less  importance  than 
whether  the  nation,  as  a  whole,  should,  or  should  not,  control 
the  supply  of  such  a  vital  necessity  as  beef.  Under  private 
ownership  the  assumption  is  that  the  production  of  goods  is 
of  interest  only  to  the  workers  engaged  in  such  production 
and  to  their  employers. 

It  is  assumed  that  between  competition  among  the  workers 
for  work,  and  competition  among  the  employers  for  workers, 
things  will  automatically  adjust  themselves  and  the  general 
public  get  its  coal  and  beef  and  the  other  things  it  may 
want  and  can  buy.  But  when  we  have  competition  among 
the  workers  eliminated  by  a  trade  union,  and  competition 
among  the  employers  eliminated  by  a  Trust,  I  should  like  to 
ask,  Where  does  the  dear  public  get  off? 

It  is  true  that  the  evolution  of  our  industrial  system  neces- 
sitates both  trusts  and  trade  unions,  but  does  the  reiteration 
of  this  theory  to  a  public  shivering  without  coal,  and  hungry 


The  Strikers  and  the  Meat  Trust  185 

for  meat  reconcile  it  to  the  predicament  in  which  it  is  placed? 
There  is  but  one  sure  way  for  the  dear  public  to  warm  and 
feed  itself,  and  that  is  to  learn  to  take  care  of  itself,  to  paddle 
its  own  canoe,  so  to  speak.  Let  the  Public  Own  the  Coal 
Trust  and  the  Beef  Trust:  Let  the  Nation  Own  All 
the  Trusts. 


186  Socialism  Inevitable 


SCIENCE  BENEFITS  THE  RICH. 

(August,    1904.) 

OUE  good  clergymen  and  professors  of  political  economy 
never  weary  of  telling  us  that  ^Rockefeller  and  others 
receive  their  great  incomes  as  a  reward  for  organ- 
izing the  labor  of  society.  They  would  have  us  infer  that  a 
man  is  paid  according  to  his  ability.  They  never  even  so 
much  as  hint  at  the  fact  that  the  immense  mass  of  humanity 
are  paid  not  in  proportion  to  their  product,  but  rather  how 
little  they  can  live  upon.  It  is  strange  that  Mr.  Hearst,  with 
all  his  zeal  for  the  toiling  masses,  should  not  take  a  moment 
of  time,  while  he  is  tossing  up  his  cap  for  his  new  friend, 
Parker,  and  explain  to  his  readers  the  impossibility  of  the 
working  class  being  able  to  better  their  condition  so  long  as 
the  competitive  wage  system  lasts.  Yet,  Hearst  does  see 
some  things  correctly.  For  instance,  he  notes  that  Professor 
0.  F.  Cook,  by  the  introduction  of  the  Guatemalan  ant, 
which  destroys  the  boll  weevil,  and  saves  the  cotton  planters 
forty  millions  a  year,  will  get  nothing  for  his  labor  above  and 
beyond  his  regular  government  salary.  If  Professor  Cook 
were  to  be  paid  on  an  interest  basis  he  should  receive  two 
thousand  million  dollars'  worth  of  two  per  cent,  government 
bonds.  As  it  is  he  gets  merely  a  living,  and  when  he  becomes 
old  in  the  service,  will  be  turned  adrift  without  a  pension. 
He  might  better  have  been  a  Filipino  killer. 

It  is  to  be  noted  that  Professor  Cook  made  his  discovery 
while  working,  not  for  a  competitive  capitalistic  corporation, 
but  for  the  state.  The  same  applies  to  Professor  Koerberle, 
the  man  who  discovered  a  remedy  for  the  white  scale  which 
was  destroying  the  orange  groves  of  California  some  ten  years 
ago.  Koerberle  heard  that  while  there  were  scale  insects  in 
Australia,  yet  they  did  not  seem  to  bother  the  oranges  there, 
from  which  he  rightly  surmised  that  there  must  be  some  coun- 
tervailing influence.  He  found  it  to  be  the  lady  bug,  the 
vedolia  cardinalis,  which  makes  a  business  of  eating  the  white 


Science  Benefits  the  Rich  187 

scale.  Koerberle  sent  over  a  colony  of  the  Australian  lady- 
bugs  to  California,  and  the  little  chaps  throve  so  well  in  their 
new  home  and  ate  so  many  insects  that  in  a  few  months  Cali- 
fornia was  rid  of  the  pest. 

What  Koerberle  did  for  the  orange  crop  Cook  now  promises 
to  do  for  cotton.  These  two  men  in  fact  have  saved  the 
country  millions  of  dollars,  and  yet  neither  will  benefit  per- 
sonally to  the  extent  of  one  cent.  And  yet  I  imagine  that 
either  of  them  would  feel  completely  rewarded  if  he  could 
only  have  a  guarantee  from  society  that  he  would  be  supported 
while  continuing  to  make  scientific  discoveries  for  the  benefit 
of  man. 

It  is  noteworthy,  moreover,  that  as  long  as  the  competitive 
system  and  private  ownership  of  property  continues  all  these 
and  other  great  discoveries  do  not  inure  to  the  benefit  of 
society  as  a  whole,  but  merely  to  the  rich.  The  extinction  of 
the  boll  weevil  will  add  little  or  nothing  to  the  pay  of  the 
negro  cotton  pickers,  whereas  it  means  much  to  the  owners 
of  the  cotton  fields  and  still  more  to  the  railways  which  have 
a  monopoly  of  the  cotton  carrying.  Similarly,  the  extinction 
of  the  orange  scale  in  California  gives  the  railways,  which 
carry  the  oranges,  the  bulk  of  the  gain. 

Competition,  in  fact,  keeps  the  rate  of  wages  and  the  price 
of  oranges  so  low  that  neither  the  grower  nor  the  picker  gets 
much  of  anything.  Yet  the  railways  receive  ninety  cents  on 
every  box  of  oranges  that  California  exports,  and  this  rate 
has  remained  uniform  for  twenty  years,  although  the  price 
of  oranges  has  decreased  from  $5  a  box  to  less  than  $1.50. 
The  railways  have  advanced  sufficiently  to  know  the  beauty 
of  combination,  while  the  ordinary  people  are  still  working 
alon?  on  the  old  starvation  competitive  basis.  The  evolution 
of  the  human  mind  is  indeed  a  slow  process. 


188  Socialism  Inevitable 


WHAT  GOOD   IS   GOVRENMENT  OWNER- 
SHIP? 

(August,    1904. 

WHAT  good  can  we  expect  from  the  government  own- 
ership of  utilities?  I  must  say  that  the  answers 
given  by  many  Socialists  to  this  reasonable  ques- 
tion are  not  as  convincing  as  they  might  be. 

With  the  present  competitive  system  remaining  in  opera- 
tion government  ownership  is  not  necessarily  any  better  for 
the  people  than  private  ownership.  It  might,  and  probably 
would  be  somewhat  better,  but  I  am  not  talking  about  the 
"might  be's" — I  speak  of  the  "must  be's."  As  often  pointed 
out,  the  Post  Office  is  a  nest  of  mismanagement  and  corrup- 
tion, and  yet  it  is  under  government  ownership.  Then  why 
urge  that  the  railroads  and  other  public  utilities  be  put  under 
government  ownership? 

I  don't.     That  is,  I  don't  urge  very  hard. 

I  can  see  some  of  my  readers  gasp  with  astonishment. 
"What's  this?  Wilshire  not  urging  government  ownership! 
Why,  we  thought  that  government  ownership  was  an  essential 
part  of  the  Socialist  program!" 

Not  at  all.  If  these  gaspers  would  read  my  editorials  long 
enough  and  carefully  enough  they  would  see  that  I  am  work- 
ing for  the  establishment  of  the  Co-operative  Commonwealth, 
and  it  is  simply  as  a  basis  for  this  Co-operative  Common- 
wealth that  I  declare  for  the  government  ownership  of  the 
machinery  of  production.  I  am  cold,  and  to  save  myself 
from  perishing  demand  clothing.  Incidentally  the  clothing 
may  make  me  more  beautiful  to  look  upon  at  the  Horse 
Show,  and  may  satisfy  my  ideas  of  modesty,  yet  both  ap- 
pearance and  modesty  are  of  secondary  consideration.  Pro- 
tection from  the  cold,  on  the  other  hand,  is  an  absolute  neces- 
sity. But  why  do  I  wish  protection  from  cold  ?  Simply  be- 
cause I  have  an  instinct  which  urges  me  to  live  rather  than 


What  Good  Is  Government  Ownership?        189 

die.  So  that  when  I  ask  for  clothing  it  is  really  asking 
for  life. 

Government  ownership  might,  and  probably  would,  be  of 
general  benefit  to  the  community  under  our  competitive 
system.  We  would  probably  have  better  rates  and  more 
comfortable  transportation.  The  roads  would  be  run  for  the 
benefit  of  the  public  instead  of  to  make  dividends  for  the 
Vanderbilts.  At  least  that  would  be  the  theory.  It  might 
not  work  out  that  way,  however,  because  the  same  interests 
which  now  control  the  Post  Office  might  control  the  railways. 
Indeed,  if  the  people  were  as  negligent  of  their  interests  then 
as  they  are  now,  government  ownership  of  railways  under 
the  existing  competitive  system  might  give  us  no  benefits  at 
all.  This,  I  admit,  is  unlikely,  and  still  it  is  not  impos- 
sible. 

Under  the  Co-operative  System,  however,  it  would  be  dif- 
ferent. In  the  first  place,  inasmuch  as  all  property  would  be 
owned  by  the  State,  there  would  be  no  powerful  group  of 
private  property  owners  to  dictate  the  policy  of  the  State 
for  their  own  benefit  at  the  expense  of  the  non-property 
owners  as  to-day,  for  instance,  the  railway  owners  dictate 
the  policy  of  the  government  regarding  post  office  affairs  so 
that  they  may  get  excessive  rates  for  carrying  mail. 

Again,  with  a  Co-operative  System  the  products  of  industry 
would  of  necessity  be  distributed  to  the  workers,  as  there 
would  be  no  one  else  having  any  claim  upon  such  products. 
If  we  were  to  allow  private  ownership  of  the  railways  and 
other  machinery  to  remain,  then  those  owners  would  naturally 
have  some  rights  accruing  from  their  title  ownership ;  other- 
wise what  would  be  the  use  of  their  having  a  title?  Now, 
the  only  rights  that  we  can  conceive  of  as  being  of  any  partic- 
ular use  would  be  the  rights  entitling  them  to  the  products 
of  labor  without  themselves  working.  If  such  were  the  case, 
and  they  took  such  products,  it  is  evident  that  the  workers 
would  not  be  getting  their  entire  share,  and  we  would  not  be 
enjoying  the  co-operative  system  which  we  set  out  to  establish. 

The  present  government  office-holders,  taking  them  as  a 
whole  outside  the  classified  service,  are  naturally  an  incom- 
petent lot  of  grafters,  for  they  are  not  there  to  serve  the  State, 
but  to  rob  it.  This  is  bound  to  continue  as  long  as  we  have 
our  system  of  private  ownership  of  capital.    In  other  words, 


190  Socialism  Inevitable 

we  are  bound  to  have  corrupt  officials  just  as  long  as  we  have 
men  with  money  ready  to  buy  franchises,  and  on  the  other 
side  aldermen  without  money  having  franchises  to  dispose  of, 
in  which  their  interest  as  one  of  a  large  cornmunity  is  much 
smaller  than  their  individual  interest  in  getting  the  whole  of 
the  bribe  from  the  capitalist. 

A  Broadway  franchise  may  be  worth  five  million  dollars 
to  the  City  of  New  York.  To  me,  as  alderman,  it  is  worth 
one  five-millionth  part  of  this,  or  exactly  one  dollar,  for  there 
are  five  million  citizens  to  share  it  with  me.  Therefore,  if  I 
am  paid  anything  over  the  dollar  for  my  vote  in  favor  of 
granting  the  franchise,  I  am  so  much  ahead.  And  just  as 
long  as  this  condition  of  affairs  exists  there  will  be  both  men 
to  buy  aldermen  and  aldermen  ready  to  be  bought.  Hence, 
if  we  wish  to  have  honest  aldermen  we  must  have  complete 
public  ownership,  so  as  to  do  away  with  the  men  who  do  the 
buying  of  aldermen.  Where  there  are  no  buyers,  of  neces- 
sity there  can  be  no  sellers. 

Now,  as  to  the  harm  combinations  do  the  public.  The 
Socialists  hold  that  a  combination  of  capitalists  does  not 
necessarily  do  any  more  harm  to  the  people  than  does  the 
single  capitalist,  but  that  they  have  more  power  to  do  such 
harm,  and  will  exert  that  power  whenever  they  find  it  to  their 
interest  to  do  so.  And  yet  the  harm  that  any  particular  com- 
bination can  do,  or  actually  does,  is  not  of  vital  importance. 
The  mere  question  whether  the  Standard  Oil  Company  charges 
an  exorbitant  price  for  oil,  or  whether  it  sells  it  for  only  a  fair 
price,  is  of  no  great  economic  import.  If  it  charges  too  much, 
that  is,  if  it  charges  a  profit  that  is  greater  than  the  capitalist 
ordinarily  expects  from  the  sale  of  his  manufactures,  then 
it  simply  means  that  the  workman  who  buys  the  oil  must  get 
higher  wages  to  pay  for  it,  and  this  higher  wage  comes  out 
of  his  employer  for  the  benefit  of  the  Standard  Oil  Company. 
This  means  in  turn  that  Kockefeller  comes  into  possession  of 
so  many  more  dollars  to  invest  than  he  otherwise  would  have 
had,  and  that  the  employer  who  paid  the  excess  wages  has  so 
many  dollars  less  to  invest.  Of  course,  it  may  be  that  the 
immediate  employer  may  not  be  the  loser,  for  he  may  add  to 
the  price  of  his  goods  the  excess  of  wages  he  has  to  pay,  and 
so  shift  the  burden  to  some  other  capitalist. 

The  point  is  that  the  high  price  of  oil  does  not  economically 


What  Good  Is  Government  Ownership?        191 

hurt  the  workman  because  his  wages  are  based  on  the  cost 
of  living.  Oil  is  a  necessity  of  life,  just  as  is  water,  or  bread, 
or  meat.  He  must  have  sufficient  wages  to  buy  these  neces- 
sities. If  the  price  goes  up  his  wages  must  go  up  or  he  will 
starve  to  death,  for  there  is  practically  no  margin  for  him  to 
infringe  upon.  A  high  price  of  oil  is  a  price  made  at  the 
general  expense  of  the  capitalist  class  for  the  benefit  of  the 
Standard  Oil  Company,  and  means  that  the  Standard  stock- 
holders have  the  directing  of  the  investment  or  the  spending 
of  a  greater  portion  of  the  surplus  products  called  profits, 
instead  of  a  certain  other  set  of  capitalists.  To  the  commu- 
nity as  a  whole  it  is  of  no  practical  importance  whether  capi- 
talist Kockefeller  or  capitalist  Morgan  gets  the  surplus. 

It  is  sometimes  asked,  are  not  Kockefeller  and  Morgan  "the 
people  ?"  And,  if  so,  what  do  we  mean  by  saying  the  people 
should  own  the  trusts  when  they  already  own  them?  Yes, 
Kockefeller  and  Morgan  are  the  people,  or  rather,  some  of 
them,  but  the  trouble  is  that  the  people  are  not  Rockefeller 
and  Morgan.  The  Morgans  are  very  considerably  less  than 
ten  per  cent,  of  the  people,  while  we  wish  to  make  one  hun- 
dred per  cent,  of  the  people  Morgans. 

Then  why,  you  ask,  do  not  laborers  combine  and  set  up 
shop  for  themselves?  This  is  exactly  what  the  Socialists 
propose.  Only  we  do  not  propose  that  the  shops  should  be 
small  competing  ones.  That  would  not  make  things  any 
better  than  they  are  to-day.  Suppose  a  few  hundred  workers 
should  combine  and  try  to  run  a  blast  furnace.  Where  would 
they  land,  with  pig  iron  selling  at  less  than  cost,  as  it  is 
to-day,  through  competition  and  over-production  ?  Would  the 
fact  that  they  owned  the  furnace  do  the  workers  any  good? 
Not  at  all;  for  instead  of  getting  wages  for  their  work  they 
would  be  forced  to  pay  assessments  to  keep  the  furnace  in 
blast.  Of  course,  this  is  an  unusual  case.  Pig  iron  is  not 
always  selling  at  less  than  cost ;  but,  on  the  other  hand,  there 
is  now  a  strong  tendency  for  prices  of  all  commodities  to 
slump,  and  there  is  no  economic  reason  why,  if  production 
keeps  up  to  the  present  standard,  we  should  not  have  over- 
production and  a  general  fall  of  prices  to  less  than  cost. 

No,  we  do  not  wish  any  small  production,  with  the  co- 
operative owners  competing  for  the  sale  of  their  products  in 
the  existing  capitalistic  field.    We  wish  national  ownership 


192  Socialism  Inevitable 

and  the  complete  elimination  of  competition  in  the  sale  of 
products  as  well  as  in  the  sale  of  labor. 

We  do  not  look  forward  to  trade-unions  taking  the  place 
of  capitalists.  We  look  forward  to  the  people  as  a  whole 
taking  charge  of  the  great  industrial  functions,  regulating 
production  upon  the  basis  of  what  the  laborers  desire,  and 
distribution  upon  the  basis  of  what  they  produce. 


When  Men  Love  Natuee  193 


WHEN  MEN  LOVE  NATURE 

(September,    1904.) 

ONE  of  the  delights  of  walking  in  Central  Park,  New 
York,  is  to  witness  the  confident  tameness  of  the  squir- 
rels. The  pretty  little  creatures,  so  wild  in  the  woods 
that  only  glimpses  can  he  seen  of  them,  are  here  as  familiar  as 
so  many  kittens.  They  have  learned  that  man  is  not  necessarily 
an  enemy,  a  squirrel-killing  monster  to  be  avoided  with  the 
greatest  care,  but  on  the  contrary  has  become  their  special 
friend  and  provider.  Every  man  that  approaches  the  squirrel, 
therefore,  is  regarded  as  a  possible  dispenser  of  delicious  pea- 
nuts, and  treated  with  becoming  politeness  and  courtesy.  It's 
a  small  thing,  apparently,  this  friendship  of  the  park  squir- 
rels, but  it  makes  us  understand  how  much  pleasure  man 
loses  by  not  being  on  good  terms  with  all  the  harmless  wild 
animals. 

Mr.  Harold  J.  Bolce  has  a  most  interesting  account  in  the 
Scientific  American  of  the  recent  visit  of  American  natural- 
ists to  the  distant  island  of  Laysan,  in  the  Pacific,  where  they 
have  discovered  some  new  birds  and  have  added  many  novel 
facts  in  regard  to  known  species.  These  were  perhaps  the 
first  human  beings  whom  the  myriads  of  birds  that  crowd 
this  tiny  speck  of  land  had  ever  seen,  and  the  visitors,  in 
consequence,  enjoyed  an  adventure  unusual  in  modern  times. 
Birds,  representing  species  which,  in  other  lands,  wing  hur- 
riedly away  at  the  sight  of  man,  came  up  to  the  naturalists, 
looked  curiously  into  their  faces,  perched  on  their  writing 
tables,  wonderingly  inspected  the  tripod  and  other  acces- 
sories of  the  cameras,  and  permitted  themselves  to  be  stroked. 

The  fact  that  these  birds  are  ordinarily  regarded  as  the  wildest 
kind  of  species  made  a  profound  impression  on  the  visiting 
scientists.  "Wherever  we  went,"  said  Walter  K.  Fisher,  who 
under  Dr.  Charles  H.  Gilbert  directed  the  Laysan  expedition, 
"we  were  free  to  watch  and  learn,  and  were  trusted  by  the  birds. 
It  was  a  most  touching  and  unique  experience,  and.  one  which 


194  Socialism  Inevitable 

demonstrates  all  too  forcibly  the  attitude  of  wild  creatures  which 
have  not  yet  learned  that  man  is  usually  an  enemy." 

Whenever  a  nest  of  white  tern  was  approached,  the  birds  would 
come  and  hover  in  front  of  the  explorers.  They  would  peer  in- 
tently into  the  faces  of  the  naturalists,  as  if  attempting  to  dis- 
cover the  purpose  of  the  unusual  intrusion.  Among  the  odd 
instances  of  lack  of  fear  on  the  part  of  these  birds  of  Laysan, 
was  the  action  of  an  albatross  which  came  up  and  peeped  into 
Mr.  Fisher's  face,  and  finding  that  he  was  disposed  to  be  friendly 
began  to  make  a  critical  examination  of  his  camera.  Many  of 
the  young  birds  of  this  species  on  the  island  permitted  them- 
selves to  be  stroked,  and  soon  acted  as  if  they  had  been  reared 
as  pets. 

Some  day  when  man  ceases  to  murder  his  fellow  man  for 
money,  and  to  shoot  the  wild  birds  for  sport,  the  whole  earth 
may  become  like  Laysan.  It  sounds  Utopian  to  think  of  a 
future  when  men  will  be  friendly  toward  each  other,  and  still 
more  Utopian  to  predict  that  men  and  birds  and  animals  will 
be  friendly;  yet  nothing  is  really  more  scientific,  for  it  is  sub- 
ject to  pioof. 


How  TO  BE  Happx  195 


HOW  TO  BE  HAPPY. 

(September,  1904.) 

THAT  the  rich  are  above  the  law,  no  better  illustration 
could  be  furnished  than  the  action  of  the  directors 
of  the  corporation  that  owned  the  steamer  "General 
Slocum,"  which  recently  burnt  up,  with  the  loss  of  a  thousand 
lives.  The  evidence  snowed  such  criminal  neglect  to  pro- 
vide life  preservers  and  proper  fire  apparatus  that  the  directors 
have  been  indicted  for  manslaughter.  After  the  indictment, 
however,  it  was  common  talk  that  nothing  would  come  of  it 
all,  and  that  the  directors  themselves  are  unafraid  can  be 
seen  from  the  way  they  are  acting  regarding  another  steam- 
boat they  own,  the  "Grand  Kepublic,"  a  sister  ship  to  the 
"General  Slocum." 

The  "Grand  Kepublic"  is  used  exclusively  for  excursions, 
and  has  a  legal  carrying  capacity  of  3,700  passengers.  Some 
weeks  previous  to  the  "Slocum"  disaster  I  myself  was  a  pas- 
senger on  this  steamer  on  a  trip  up  the  Hudson  Eiver.  There 
were  at  least  2,000  more  on  board  than  the  law  allowed,  yet 
tickets  were  sold  to  all  who  applied.  She  was  so  crowded 
that  when  she  made  her  stop  at  125th  street — she  started  from 
23rd — a  great  many  passengers  got  off,  having  realized  by 
that  time  that  the  crowd  was  too  great  for  comfort,  quite 
apart  from  considerations  of  danger,  and  preferring  to  forfeit 
their  fares  rather  than  continue  the  trip.  If  a  fire  had 
occurred  that  day,  even  if  there  had  been  plenty  of  good  life 
preservers,  there  would  certainly  have  been  an  immense  loss 
of  life.  This  kind  of  overcrowding,  moreover,  is  the  rule  with 
excursion  boats,  not  only  in  New  York,  but  in  fact  in  every 
other  American  city.  There  is  no  country  in  the  world  where 
profits  are  put  so  far  ahead  of  human  life  as  in  our  dear  Land 
of  Liberty. 

However,  to  continue  my  story.  After  the  burning  of  the 
"Slocum"  there  was  a  demand  for  a  general  reinspection  of 
all  excursion  steamers  about  New  York  harbor.    I  am  not 


196  Socialism  Inevitable 

very  credulous,  but  I  admit  that  I  thought  to  myself  that  the 
lesson  of  the  "Slocum"  would  certainly  warn  the  directors  to 
get  the  "Grand  Republic"  in  shape  to  pass  this  new  inspection. 
I  did  think  that  men  under  indictment  for  manslaughter 
would  be  careful  to  avoid  another  indictment.  On  the  con- 
trary, not  only  did  they  fail  to  prepare  the  "Grand  Republic," 
but  they  actually  contested  the  right  of  the  government  to 
re-inspect!  However,  the  re-inspection  was  made,  and  what 
the  same  inspector,  two  months  ago,  pronounced  safe,  he  now 
pronounces  unsafe.  The  life  preservers  were  found  to  be 
absolutely  rotten  and  incapable  of  sustaining  even  twenty-four 
pounds  of  lead,  and  the  fire  hose  was  as  rotten  as  the  life 
preservers.  As  for  a  fire  drill,  the  crew  had  never  heard  of 
such  a  thing. 

Now  it  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  all  this  criminal  negli- 
gence is  found  on  the  "Grand  Republic"  a  full  month  or 
more  after  her  owners  had  been  indicted  for  criminal  negli- 
gence regarding  the  "Slocum."  If  this  diabolical  conduct 
does  not  show  a  contempt  for  the  power  of  the  law  when  it 
comes  to  the  protection  of  the  weak  and  helpless,  then  there 
has  never  been  an  example  of  it  in  the  history  of  nations. 

Money  has  now  become  such  a  power  in  this  country,  and 
has  such  an  absolute  dominance  over  our  courts,  that  it  is 
almost  hopeless  to  look  for  any  good  results  from  the  passage 
of  laws  designed  to  protect  man  as  against  the  money-bag. 
We  have  seen  how  the  trade-unions  are  being  crippled  by  one 
decision  after  the  other.  We  have  seen  how  in  Colorado  the 
referendum  is  disregarded  by  the  corporations  and  the  Con- 
stitution scoffed  at. 

Now  if  the  nation  is  not  ruled  by  money,  it  is  certainly 
ruled  by  the  men  who  rule  money,  and  the  only  men  who  can 
rule  money  are  those  who  own  money.  Ergo,  if  the  Nation 
would  rule  money,  it  must  own  money. 

What  is  money?  When  we  saw  Rockefeller  is  worth  lots 
of  money  what  do  we  mean?  Do  we  mean  he  has  lots  of 
dollar  bills  in  his  vest  pocket?  Of  course  not.  Rockefeller 
might  be  worth  a  billion  dollars  and  yet  not  have  ten  in  the 
bank.  Let  him  own  the  trusts  and  the  railways,  and  he  can 
own  a  billion  of  money  whenever  he  wishes.  The  trusts  com- 
mand money,  and  money  commands  the  nation.    Hence  when 


How  to  be  Happy  197 

we  use  the  word  money  we  use  it  metaphorically.  We  don't 
mean  actual  dollars  and  cents,  but  we  mean  railways  and 
other  forms  of  capital,  the  ownership  of  which  carries  the 
power  of  extracting  the  dollars  from  the  people.  When  I 
say,  Let  the  Nation  Own  the  Money,  I  do  not  mean,  Let  the 
Nation  Own  the  Gold  Dollars  and  the  Greenbacks;  I  mean, 
Let  the  Nation  Own  the  Trusts.  Once  owning  the 
Trusts,  the  Nation  will  have  no  more  difficulty  than  Mr. 
Kockefeller  in  commanding  money. 

If  we  do  not  want  to  have  any  more  loss  of  life  in  Iroquois 
theatres  or  Slocum  steamboats,  then  let  us  do  away  with  the 
profit  system,  which  causes  men  to  burn  up  their  fellows  for 
the  sake  of  a  few  half-dollars.  If  we  do  not  wish  to  shorten 
the  lives  of  millions  of  our  fellowmen  who  are  working  un- 
necessarily long  hours  in  unhealthf ul  factories,  then  let  us  be 
the  owners  of  those  factories  ourselves  and  regulate  our  hours 
and  the  conditions  of  our  labor.  Instead  of  allowing  a  few 
soulless  corporations  to  sweat  and  murder  us  on  the  plan  of 
making  the  most  profit  utterly  regardless  of  life,  let  us  be  our 
own  masters. 

If  we  wish  this  earth  to  be  our  Paradise,  then  Let  the 
Nation  Own  the  Trusts.  Does  this  sound  hifalutin?  What~r 
is  Paradise  but  a  place  where  you  do  what  you  like?  And 
what  you  like  is  obedience  to  God.  This  has  an  ugly  sound  - 
for  most  of  us,  since  it  usually  means  doing  something  we 
do  not  wish  to  do,  in  order  that  someone  else  may  have  the 
fruit  of  our  work.  Be  unhappy  yourself  that  someone  else 
may  be  happy  is  no  divine  mandate.  God's  law,  on  the  con- 
trary, is  simply  the  law  that  impels  us  all  to  do  what  is 
best  for  the  social  organism,  and  when  we  do  what  is  best 
for  all,  we  are  doing  what  is  best  for  ourselves  and  thereby 
derive  the  greatest  happiness. 

Under  present  conditions,  however,  we  cannot  do  what  is 
best  either  for  ourselves,  for  our  neighbors,  or  for  humanity. 
Therefore  we  are  unhappy  and  this  world  is  not  Paradise. 
We  simply  cannot  be  good  as  things  are  to-day,  and  unless 
we  are  good  we  cannot  be  happy.  Hence  no  one  is  happy. 
If  we  would  be  good,  we  must  have  conditions  which  allow 
of  goodness.  The  primary  condition  is  liberty  for  each  in- 
dividual to  be  able  to  work  to  the  best  advantage  for  humanity 


198  Socialism  Inevitable 

as  a  whole,  for  by  so  doing  he  is  getting  the  best  for  himself. 
To  do  this  we  must  control  the  earth  and  manage  it  for 
ourselves.  Someone  else  cannot  do  this  for  us  any  more  than 
someone  else  can  be  good  and  happy  for  us.  To  control  and 
manage  the  earth  we  must  own  it,  and  as  a  first  step  toward 
that  ownership  we  cry:  Let  the  Nation  Own  the 
Trusts. 


Shaw's  "Super-Man"  199 


SHAW'S  SUPERMAN 

(October,    1904.) 

BERNAED  Shaw  has  at  last  arrived.  I  speak  metaphoric- 
ally. Years  ago,  when  I  first  visited  London,  it  was  in 
the  beginnings  of  the  Socialist  movement,  and  Shaw 
was  then  a  young  Irish  journalist,  finding  it  difficult  to  make 
ends  meet.  However,  it  never  daunted  his  spirits,  and  he  was 
then,  as  he  is  now,  the  bright  particular  wit  in  our  London  So- 
cialist set.  We  all  recognized  his  brilliancy ;  in  fact,  Shaw  him- 
self recognized  it  and  joined  with  us  in  a  general  regret  that 
the  public  were  so  blind  to  it.  Not  that  we  cared  so  much  about 
Shaw's  personal  loss  in  his  failure  to  win  recognition,  but 
we  felt  that  if  he  were  recognized,  he  would  be  able  to  get 
so  much  the  better  audience  to  which  he  might  expound  our, 
and  his,  Socialist  views.  I  was  not  in  great  hopes,  however, 
for  I  confess  that  I  did  not  credit  London  and  New  York  for 
the  discernment  they  have  shown  in  at  last  recognizing  him. 
His  plays  were  too  clever,  it  seemed  to  me,  to  be  adapted  to 
a  general  audience ;  this  quite  apart  from  the  question  whether 
they  are  really  good  plays  from  the  purely  dramatic  stand- 
point. 

However,  as  said,  Shaw  has  arrived,  not  only  with  his 
plays,  but  with  anything  that  he  may  now  write ;  and  that  he 
is  using  his  pinnacle  to  disseminate  Socialism,  although  after 
his  own  particular  methods,  is  unnecessary  to  state.  Shaw 
and  I  were  never  altogether  at  one  upon  our  Socialism,  and 
I  am  not  sure  that  either  he  or  I  are  at  one  with  anyone  else 
in  particular. 

Shaw  never  would  grasp  the  meaning  of  the  economic 
development  of  the  Trust  in  the  United  States.  Way  back 
in  1890,  when  I  was  lecturing  in  London,  he  took  the  stage 
against  me  one  night  and  endeavored  to  show  that  I  was  all 
wrong  in  my  statement  of  America's  being  industrially  in 
advance  of  Europe,  and  that  it  was  this  superiority  of  Amer- 
ica which  had  caused  the  Trust.    Since  then  iiie  American 


200  Socialism  Inevitable 

invasion  of  Europe  has  convinced  Shaw  that  I  was  right  in 
my  facts,  but  I  doubt  if  he  yet  agrees  with  me  in  my  con- 
clusions. 

He  started  out  with  the  rest  of  the  Fabians  as  a  Utopian 
revolutionist.  The  Fabian  society  took  its  name  from  the 
Fabian  motto  to  make  ready  slowly  but  surely,  to  be  able 
finally  to  give  a  sudden  and  deadly  stroke.  The  Fabians  have 
done  with  revolutionism  nowadays  and  no  longer  quote  their 
motto,  although  they  still  stick  to  the  name. 

Last  summer,  when  I  was  in  London,  I  tried  to  explain  to 
Shaw  and  the  other  Fabians  that  the  revolution  which  I  was 
predicting  in  America  was  not  going  to  come  from  any  slow 
preparation  by  the  Socialists  and  then,  finally,  a  terrible  blow, 
but  that  it  was  brewing  with  the  industrial  development  of 
the  country.  That  the  nearness  of  the  climax  was  due  not  to 
any  determination  of  the  people  to  throw  off  their  yoke,  but 
to  the  absolute  necessity  of  revolution  in  order  to  meet  a 
great  unemployed  problem. 

All  my  talk,  however,  was  in  vain.  The  English  Fabian 
classifies  all  revolutions  together.  He  insists  that  by  revolution 
one  must  mean  the  sudden  uprising  of  the  working  class,  the 
barricading  of  streets,  the  upsetting  of  the  government,  and 
the  forcible  instituting  of  Socialism  over  night  by  the  work- 
ing class,  against  the  will  of  all  the  other  classes  in  the  com- 
munity. 

Such  a  program  no  one  is  more  willing  than  myself  to 
admit  is  a  silly,  ridiculous  one.  None  but  the  very  young 
Socialists  have  any  such  ideas.  Socialism,  when  it  comes, 
will  come  with  the  practical  assent  of  the  whole  community, 
although  this  assent  will  be  "given  only  when  it  is  evident  to 
all  that  Socialism  has  become  an  absolute  economic  neces- 
sity. This  day,  according  to  my  theories  of  economics,  is  not 
so  far  off,  and  the  Trust,  in  which  Shaw  sees  nothing,  is  the 
sign  that  I  judge  by. 

However,  whether  Shaw  or  myself  are  right  upon  the  ques- 
tion of  the  Trust,  there  is  no  doubt  that  Shaw  is  doing  some 
splendid  literary  work  and,  incidentally,  is  teaching  the  public 
a  great  many  things  that  they  ought  to  know.  Arnold  Daly 
made  a  remarkable  success  last  winter  in  New  York  in  the 
production  of  Shaw's  "Candida,"  and  the  discussion  of  the 


Shaw's  "Super-Man"  201 

sociologic  points  raised  by  the  play  was  of  great  value  to  all 
America. 

Shaw  has  just  written  another  new  play,  "Man  and  Super- 
man." This  certainly  is  high-water  mark  for  Shaw,  and  those 
of  my  readers  who  wish  to  know  why  he  has  set  the  literary 
world  afire  must  read  it.  Even  if  he  fails  to  understand  the 
Trust  Problem,  he  does  understand  the  Life  Problem,  and  that 
is  the  more  important.  Here  is  a  brief  extract  giving  a  dia- 
logue in  hell,  which  takes  place  between  Don  Juan  and  the 
Devil  (both  characters  in  "Man  and  Superman") : 

Don  Juan — What  you  call  bosh  is  the  only  thing  men  dare  for. 
Later  on,  Liberty  will  not  be  catholic  enough:  men  will  die  for 
human  perfection,  to  which  they  will  sacrifice  all  their  liberties 
gladly. 

The  Devil — Ah!  they  will  never  be  at  a  loss  for  an  excuse  for 
killing  one  another. 

Don  Juan — What  of  that?  It  is  not  death  that  matters,  but  the 
fear  of  death.  It  is  not  killing  and  dying  that  degrades  us,  but 
base  living,  and  accepting  the  wages  and  profits  and  degradation. 
Better  ten  men  dead  than  one  live  slave  of  his  master.  Men 
shall  yet  rise  up,  father  against  son  and  brother  against  brother, 
and  kill  one  another  for  the  great  catholic  idea  of  abolishing 
slavery. 

The  Devil — Yes,  when  Liberty  and  Equality  of  you  which 
prate  shall  have  made  free  white  Christians  cheaper  in  the  labor 
market  than  black  heathen  slaves  sold  by  auction  at  the  block. 

Don  Juan — Never  fear!  the  white  laborer  shall  have  his  turn, 
too.  But  I  am  not  now  defending  the  illusory  forms  that  great 
ideas  take.  I  am  giving  you  examples  of  the  fact  that  this 
creature  Man,  who  in  his  own  selfish  affairs  is  a  coward  to  the 
backbone,  will  fight  for  an  idea  like  a  hero.  He  may  be  abject 
as  a  citizen;  but  he  is  dangerous  as  a  fanatic.  He  can  only  be 
enslaved  whilst  he  is  spiritually  weak  enough  to  listen  to  reason. 
I  tell  you,  gentlemen,  if  you  can  show  a  man  a  piece  of  what  he 
calls  God's  work  to  do,  and  what  he  will  later  on  call  by  many 
new  names,  you  can  make  him  entirely  reckless  of  the  conse- 
quences to  himself  personally. 

What  can  he  deeper  than  his  lines  that  man  can  only  be 
enslaved  when  listening  to  reason?  It  sounds  straining  for 
a  paradox,  but  it's  not;  it  is  merely  the  bald  truth.  Man 
does  his  noblest  work  when  he  appears  to  the  world  as  the 
most  unreasonable  fanatic.  The  reasonable  man  tries  to  save 
his  own  soul;  the  unreasoning  man  saves  the  souls  of  others, 
and  thus  gains  his  own  salvation. 

I  had  but  little  opportunity  to  see  much  of  Shaw  last 


202  Socialism  Inevitable 

year.  Only  time  for  a  lunch  with  him  and  Mrs.  Shaw,  a 
delightful  acquisition  he  has  made  since  the  old  days,  at  his 
apartments  on  Adelphi  Terrace.  He  is  in  much  better  health 
than  formerly,  owing,  I  am  sure,  to  Mrs.  Shaw's  care  in  see- 
ing that  his  carrots  and  beets  are  sufficiently  boiled,  for  Shaw 
is  still  a  hot  vegetarian.  Formerly,  when  he  accepted  my 
invitation  to  dinner,  he  would  note,  "No  corpses,  please." 

I  wish  Shaw  would  come  to  this  country  and  lecture.  It 
matters  not  what  his  subject  would  be;  he  would  be  sure  to 
talk  Socialism,  and  his  name  would  attract  big  audiences. 


What  Men  Vote  Foe  203 


WHAT  MEN  VOTE  FOR 

(October,   1904.) 

THE  great  mass  of  voters,  whether  of  the  two  old  parties, 
of  the  Independents,  or  of  the  Socialist  party,  cast 
their  votes  in  the  way  that  they  think  will  best  benefit 
the  country  as  a  whole.  The  strongest  and  most  fundamental 
instinct  of  man  is  to  act  so  as  to  best  preserve  the  race,  since 
his  own  preservation  would  otherwise  be  impaired.  It  is 
true  that  there  are  always  a  few  who  will  betray  their  fellow 
men  in  order  to  save  themselves,  but  such  men  are  the  excep- 
tion. From  earliest  history,  all  records  show  that  the  indi- 
vidual man  has  laid  down  his  life  that  the  greater  man,  the 
race,  or  the  nation,  might  live.  The  old  cry,  For  God,  King, 
and  Country,  was  quite  as  perfect  and  as  completely  in  har- 
mony with  the  evolutionary  history  of  man  if  it  had  been  scien- 
tifically prepared.  And  the  cry  is  just  as  good  to-day  in  our 
sordid  struggle  for  wealth  as  it  was  in  the  days  of  Charle- 
magne. 

Equally  true  is  it  that  wars,  whether  conducted  with  cross- 
bows, with  modern  rifles,  or  with  the  ballot,  are  all  funda- 
mentally of  the  same  nature.  We  vote  as  we  used  to  fight, 
for  God,  King,  and  Country.  By  God,  I  mean  the  highest 
spiritual  ideal  that  we  are  capable  of  conceiving;  by  King,  I 
mean  the  material  manifestation  of  this  ideal  in  the  form  of 
our  candidates  and  our  party;  by  our  Country,  I  mean  that 
particular  organization  of  society  to  which  we  happen  to  be 
individually  attached,  and  which  we  naturally  think  the  most 
important  factor  in  the  race  as  a  whole. 
■  "Our  Country,"  of  course,  is  a  very  elastic  term,  and  has 
a  different  meaning  to  men  of  different  nationalities;  and 
it  is  not  always  merely  birth  or  residence  that  determines  its 
definition.  Before  the  Bevolutionary  War,  most  Americans 
would  have  defined  their  own  particular  colony  as  their 
country,  while  up  to  the  time  of  the  Civil  War,  a  Virginian 
would  probably  have  applied  the  term  to  Virginia  rather 


204  Socialism  Inevitable 

than  to  the  whole  nation.  He  certainly  regarded  the  South- 
ern States  as  a  much  more  important  organism  to  hold  intact 
and  to  fight  for,  than  the  nation  as  a  whole,  and  his  willing- 
ness to  die  for  the  South  was  well  exemplified.  If  we  go 
back  to  the  time  when  men  lived  in  nomadic  tribes,  we  find 
that  country  meant  simply  the  tribal  organization,  which  was 
attached  to  no  particular  part  of  the  earth,  and  that  men 
were  just  as  willing  to  die  for  their  tribe  as  were  the  Vir- 
ginians for  their  sacred  soil. 

It  seems  odd  to  say  that  the  man  who  votes  for  a  Roosevelt 
or  a  Parker  is  impelled  to  do  so  by  the  same  fundamental 
motive  that  impels  a  man  to  die  for  his  country,  but  such 
is  really  the  case.  Yet  to  those  who  have  given  careful  and 
intelligent  thought  to  the  economic  and  social  conditions, 
and  who  know  that  with  the  continuance  of  our  competitive 
system  the  nation  must  remain  in  pain  and  poverty,  it  is  folly 
to  vote  for  either.  Neither  advocates  a  change  of  system. 
To  vote  for  Eoosevelt  or  for  Parker  is  simply  to  vote  for  the 
perpetuation  of  poverty,  and  the  only  excuse  for  such  a  vote 
is  ignorance.  This  is  the  true  explanation  of  most  of  the 
votes  cast  in  this  country,  either  for  the  Republican  or  Demo- 
cratic parties.  It  is  not  that  the  voters  are  aware  what  these 
parties  stand  for,  nor  knowing  that  things  could  be  changed 
for  the  better,  that  they  wish  them  to  remain  as  they  are. 
Not  at  all.  The  Republican  is  just  as  sincere  in  thinking  that 
by  voting  for  Roosevelt  he  is  working  for  the  best  interest  of 
the  country  as  is  the  Socialist  who  votes  for  Debs.  The  only 
difference  between  them  is  one  of  knowledge.  A  great  many 
Socialists  have  the  erroneous  idea  that  the  Republicans  and 
Democrats  can  see  that  the  present  competitive  system  robs 
the  producers,  but  vote  for  its  continuance  because  they  hope 
to  participate  in  the  swag.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  I  doubt  if 
there  is  a  single  individual  in  either  party,  not  even  Rocke- 
feller or  Morgan,  who  understands  the  inevitable  exploitation 
of  the  producer  as  the  natural  outcome  of  the  competitive 
system.  Workingmen  by  the  thousand  who  are  going  to  vote 
for  Roosevelt  have  practically  the  same  economic  views  as 
those  held  by  the  capitalist,  and  no  more  realize  that  they  are 
living  under  a  peculiar  and  unnatural  system  of  industry  than 
the  codfish  realizes  that  it  lives  in  water.  They  think  the 
present  system  is  a  permanent  one ;  that  it  is  the  natural  and 


What  Men  Vote  For  205 

perpetual  order  of  industry.  Therefore  their  only  aim  is  so 
to  foster  business  that  the  capitalist  may  be  prosperous,  and 
employ  workingmen  at  high  wages  and  short  hours. 

It  is  the  aim  of  the  politicians  to  convince  the  voters  that 
their  particular  man,  Parker  or  Eoosevelt  as  the  case  may  be, 
is  the  man  who  will  best  conduct  the  country  in  the  capital- 
ists' interest.  The  capitalist  will  be  swayed  by  such  arguments 
because  he  wishes  to  make  money;  and  the  workingman,  be- 
cause he  knows  that  if  the  capitalists  make  money,  he  may 
get  better  wages. 

It  is  the  mission  of  the  Socialist,  on  the  other  hand,  to 
make  plain  to  the  people,  whether  they  be  capitalists  or  work- 
ingmen, exactly  what  the  competitive  system  means.  That 
the  workingmen  should  be,  and  are,  more  receptive  than  the 
capitalists  to  Socialistic  philosophy,  goes  without  saying; 
but  it  is  an  entirely  unwarranted  assumption  that  the  capital- 
ist, once  intellectually  convinced  of  the  iniquity  of  the  com- 
petitive system  and  of  the  superiority  and  practicability  of 
Socialism,  will  still  be  averse  to  a  change.  It  is  often  difficult 
to  make  the  workingman  understand  the  possibility  or  the 
desirability  of  this  change,  yet  nobody  would  think  of  at- 
tributing his  slowness  of  comprehension  to  the  idea  that  he 
is  a  beneficiary  of  the  present  system :  it  is  plainly  mere  rank 
stupidity.  With  the  capitalist  this  also  may  be  true,  in  which 
case  his  stupidity  is  enhanced  by  his  unwillingness;  but  the 
fact  remains  that  he  usually  does  not  understand,  and  may, 
therefore,  be  said  to  oppose  the  movement  blindly. 

That  it  is  impossible  to  convert  a  capitalist  to  Socialism 
is  false,  both  from  experiment  and  from  theory.  Let  us, 
therefore,  make  it  our  business  to  show  all  men,  whether, they 
be  rich  or  poor,  the  injustice  of  the  present  competitive  system. 
Let  us  show  them  that  under  Socialism,  all  classes  will  be 
benefited  beyond  words.  That  not  only  will  the  workingman 
receive  his  just  dues,  his  full  product,  but  that  he  will  live 
in  a  genial  world  where  all  men  are  brothers,  and  the  fear  of 
want  is  forever  abolished.  Let  the  rich  man  see  that,  although 
he  will  lose  the  opportunity  of  appropriating  to  himself  the 
earnings  of  others,  he  wiil,  nevertheless,  be  immeasurably 
happier  in  a  world  where  men  no  longer  scheme  to  defraud 
one  another,  and  successful  robbery  will  bring  neither  honor 
nor  pleasure  to  the  robber. 


206  Socialism  Inevitable 

Let  lis  once  convince  the  voter  that  it  is  up  to  him  to  decide 
with  his  ballot  whether  poverty  shall  continue  or  not,  and 
the  mere  question  of  the  strenuosity  of  a  Koosevelt  or  the 
conservatism  of  a  Parker  fades  into  obscurity  before  the 
broader  problem  of  justice  to  man. 


Class  vs.  Class:  Resultant  207 


CLASS  VS.  CLASS:   RESULTANT 

(November,  1904.) 

SOMETIMES  people  enroll  themselves  as  Socialists  under 
the  impulse  of  the  moment,  hut  later,  upon  attending 
some  Socialist  meeting  and  hearing  a  speaker  declare 
the  absolute  necessity  of  accepting  the  "Class  Struggle" — 
the  term  being  used  in  its  most  limited  sense — as  prerequisite 
to  being  labeled  a  good,  sound  Socialist,  they  come  to  the 
conclusion  that  they  have  joined  the  wrong  movement. 

They  may  have  accepted  the  necessity  of  the  abolition  of 
the  competitive  system,  and  the  introduction  of  a  co-opera- 
tive system,  based  upon  the  public  ownership  of  the  means 
of  production,  and  have  supposed  that  this  was  enough  to 
qualify  them  for  membership;  but  when  they  find  that  they 
must  not  only  endorse  Socialism,  but  also  agree  that  it  shall 
be  brought  about  in  one  particular  way  and  no  other,  viz., 
by  the  working  class  organizing  and  forcibly  taking  posses- 
sion of  the  earth  in  spite  of  the  active  and  continued  oppo- 
sition of  the  capitalist  class,  they  naturally  recoil.  Where- 
upon they  find  themselves  subjected  to  the  scorn  of  the  "ortho- 
dox" Socialist,  and  are  told  that  they  do  not  understand  the 
doctrine  as  laid  down  by  Marx. 

But  what  is  the  Marxian  position?  Let  me  give  a  state- 
ment of  it,  with  which  I  myself  entirely  agree,  taken  from 
a  recent  editorial  in  Justice,  the  official  organ  of  the  English 
Socialists : 

Briefly  stated,  the  Marxian  proposition  amounts  to  this:  All 
wealth  is  the  result  of  labor  applied  to  natural  objects.  It  is  as 
impossible  to  differentiate  between  the  proportion  of  wealth  due 
to  natural  objects  and  that  due  to  labor  as  it  is  to  say  how  much 
of  a  child  belongs  to  the  father  and  how  much  to  the  mother. 
Labor  is  the  father  and  earth  the  mother  of  all  wealth.  Capital 
is  that  part  of  the  product  which  is  set  aside  for  reproductive 
purposes.  In  itself  it  is  part  of  the  product  of  labor.  The  total 
product,  therefore,  is  due  to  labor  and  belongs  to  labor.  In 
private  hands,  however,  capital  becomes  not  only  a  means  of 


208  Socialism  Inevitable 

reproduction,  an  accessory  to  labor,  but  also  a  means  for  exploit- 
ing labor.  All  wealth,  therefore,  which  goes  to  others  than  the 
workers,  is  so  much  robbery  of  labor.  It  is  in  antagonism  to  this 
theory  of  labor  that  modern  Socialism  takes  its  stand.  It  insists 
upon  the  class  antagonism  necessarily  arising  from  the  exploita- 
tion and  robbery  of  labor  through  the  class  ownership  of  the 
means  of  production,  and  aims  at  the  extinction  of  this  class 
struggle  by  the  emancipation  of  the  proletariat  and  the  abolition 
of  the  class  ownership  of  the  means  of  production. 

Now,  one  who  cannot  see  the  necessity  of  a  class  struggle 
preceding  the  institution  of  Socialism,  has  a  very  poor  idea 
of  Marx's  position,  and,  in  fact,  must  be  going  through  the 
world  with  closed  eyes  and  ears.  Indeed  it  is  not  necessary 
to  be  a  Socialist  at  all  to  see  the  class  feeling  that  exists 
between  the  rich  and  poor.  Furthermore,  while  it  may  be 
regarded  as  extremely  improbable,  it  is  not  absolutely  im- 
possible that  the  rich,  with  the  palpable  injustice  of  the 
present  system  appealing  to  their  higher  natures,  and  at  the 
same  time  convinced  that  this  system  must  soon  give  way  of 
its  own  weight,  and  that  the  period  of  transition  may  prove 
a  time  of  great  danger  and  hardship  to  both  rich  and  poor — 
it  is  not  impossible,  I  say,  that  a  very  considerable  proportion 
of  the  rich  will  themselves  join  with  the  working  class  and 
assist  actively  in  the  bringing  about  of  Socialism.  Indeed, 
it  is  my  own  belief  that  this  may  occur,  and  yet  I  am  a  be- 
liever in  the  "Class  Struggle." 

Of  course,  I  am  not  Utopian  enough  to  suppose  that  any 
considerable  body  of  the  rich  will  ever  advocate  Socialism 
until  it  is  evident  to  them  that  the  ship  of  capitalism  is  about 
to  founder,  and  that  it  is  time  for  all  sensible  rats  to  desert. 
But  simply  because  I  believe  that  many  capitalists  have  the 

L brains  of  rats,  and  that  quite  a  number  have  the  hearts  of 
ordinary  men,  I  have  had  it  thrown  at  me  that  I  am  relying 
upon  the  rich  to  hand  us  Socialism  upon  a  silver  platter. 
This  is  palpably  absurd.  We  will  get  nothing  except  that 
which  must,  from  the  inexorable  course  of  evolutionary  pro- 
gress, be  given  us : — our  exact  due,  no  more,  no  less. 

CNow,  inasmuch  as  Socialism  will  be  of  essential  benefit  to 
the  whole  of  humanity,  and  as  the  individual  lives  only  by  and 
through  the  racial  life,  it  is  fundamentally  instinctive  with 
him  to  sacrifice  himself  for  the  sake  of  the  race.  This  in- 
stinct, moreover,  is  equally  strong  in  all  of  us,  that  is  so  far 


Class  vs.  Class:  Eesultant  209 

as  class  distinctions  are  concerned.  It  may  vary  in  individ- 
uals, but  I  doubt  if  any  particular  variance  can  be  found 
according  to  class. 

It  manifests  itself  in  various  ways.  Going  to  war  "to  save 
the  Union"  was  a  very  popular  way  to  display  it  about  forty 
years  ago,  and  certainly  no  one  would  say  that  either  in  the 
South  or  in  the  North  was  the  eagerness  to  enlist  determined 
by  the  fact  that  a  man  belonged  to  the  working  class  or  to 
the  capitalist  class.  A  child  falls  off  a  ferry  boat;  a  man 
plunges  in  to  save  it.  The  chances  are  that  he  is  a  poor 
man,  but  simply  because  there  are  many  more  poor  than  rich, 
and  not  because  a  rich  man  would  not  be  as  ready  to  risk  his 
life  to  save  the  child.  Hence,  so  far  as  racial  instinct  is  con- 
cerned, a  rich  man  may  be  as  likely  to  advocate  Socialism  as  a 
poor  man,  and  the  fact  that  certain  rich  men  do  advocate 
Socialism  is  in  evidence. 

Socialism,  however,  like  war,  not  only  affects  the  race  as  a 
whole,  but  individuals  in  particular.  That  is,  the  individual 
may  be  more  influenced  by  the  effect  on  himself,  or  on  his 
class,  than  by  the  effect  upon  the  race  in  general.  If  he  is 
a  working  man,  he  has,  as  Marx  declared,  nothing  but  his 
chains  to  lose  and  a  world  to  gain;  and  the  only  excuse  an 
American  workingman  can  have  for  not  being  a  Socialist  is 
a  defective  intellect.  If  he  is  a  rich  man,  he  may  hastily 
conclude  that  it  is  better  to  let  things  remain  undisturbed, 
bad  as  they  are  for  the  majority,  so  long  as  they  are  fairly 
good  for  him.  He  is  not  forced  to  do  disagreeable  work, 
and  has  all  the  good  things  of  life  that  he  wants.  Hence 
his  racial  consciousness  is  not  so  pronounced  as  to  make  him 
feel  that  he  cannot  enjoy  his  life  without  having  all  other 
men  enjoy  it.  Thus  it  may  be,  and  usually  is,  that  the  rich 
man  opposes  Socialistic  legislation  simply  because  it  tends  to 
diminish  his  present-day  pleasures. 

Nevertheless,  in  this  same  rich,  selfish  man  the  racial  in- 
stinct exists  even  though  it  may  lie  dormant.  How  often  we 
have  had  the  example  of  rich  men  pursuing  their  end  of 
money-getting  in  the  most  relentless  way,  and  then  be- 
queathing their  wealth  for  the  general  good.  There  is  no 
man  who  would  not  do  good  for  the  race  if  he  felt  that  the 
doing  of  it  would  not  result  in  evil  to  himself  individually, 
and  there  are  many  men  who  will  do  good  for  the  race  even 


210  Socialism  Inevitable 

if  it  mean  death  to  themselves  individually.  Between  these 
extremes  lies  all  human  nature. 

I  am  of  the  belief  that  our  industrial  evolution  has  now 
proceeded  so  far  that  a  crisis  is  almost  at  hand  that  will 
practically  make  all  of  us  see  the  absolute  necessity  of  most 
heroic  measures  being  taken  to  meet  it.  I  think  a  huge  un- 
employed problem  of  unexampled  proportions  is  about  to  de- 
velop. It  would  be  with  us  to-day  were  it  not  that  certain 
unanticipated  events  have  raised  the  price  of  wheat  and 
cotton  so  high  that  our  farmers  are  in  position  to  buy  goods 
of  our  manufacturers  for  home  consumption  to  such  an 
extent  that  over-production  is  being  unexpectedly  relieved. 
All  this,  however,  is  but  temporary.  The  day  of  joy  for  the 
cotton  and  wheat  growers  will  not  last  forever. 

When  this  crisis  occurs,  it  will  not  be  necessary  for  the 
people  to  study  Marx  to  understand  that  something  must 
be  done  to  relieve  the  situation.  Millions  of  unemployed 
men  mean  millions  of  dollars  lost  to  the  capitalists,  and  there 
will  be  a  national  demand  for  government  action,  much  like 
the  demand  for  the  President  to  intervene  at  the  time  of  the 
great  coal  strike. 

Furthermore,  this  will  not  be  particularly  a  class  demand, 
but  will  be  from  the  whole  nation,  because  the  whole  nation 
will  be  affected.  The  demand  for  the  settlement  of  the  coal 
strike  was  not  from  the  working  classes  alone,  but  from  the 
general  public  who  were  being  put  to  great  inconvenience  by 
the  stoppage  of  the  coal  supply. 

When  the  demand  for  national  action  becomes  pressing 
enough,  if  the  President  should  not  appoint  a  national  com- 
mittee, there  will  be  a  committee  formed  some  other  way. 
The  national  demand  must  have  an  organ  to  express  that  de- 
mand, and  not  only  to  express  it,  but  to  carry  out  its  wishes. 

This  demand  in  the  early  stages  of  the  crisis  will  be  very 
indefinite.  It  will  be  merely  to  the  effect  that  something 
must  be  done,  something,  anything  to  relieve  the  crisis.  It 
will  be  a  demand  of  such  an  indefinite  character  and  so  far 
from  revolutionary  that  the  most  conservative  people  will  join 
in  voicing  it.  It  may  be  nothing  more  than  a  general  plan 
for  the  nation  to  give  work  at  nominal  pay  to  the  unem- 
ployed, and  will,  in  all  probability,  receive  general  support 
from  religious  and  charitable  people. 


Class  vs.  Class:  Kesultant  211 

But  as  these  first  attempts  to  brush  back  the  sea  of  revolu- 
tion with  the  broom  of  charity  are  found  to  be  futile,  more 
decided  measures  will  be  agreed  upon.  I  say  "agreed  upon" 
because  of  my  picture  of  a  national  committee  hastily  called 
together  by  the  nation  with  the  mandate  to  settle  the  crisis. 
If  mild  remedies  do  not  avail,  then  severer  and  severer  ones 
must  be  used  until  at  last  the  heroic  dose  of  Socialism  will 
be  administered  as  the  only  possible  remedy  adequate  to  save 
the  nation's  life. 

At  the  beginning  of  things  Socialism  will  not  be  generally 
thought  of.  It  will  only  be  the  inexorable  logic  of  events 
piling  up  with  terrifying  rapidity  that  will  finally  bring  the 
conservative  members  of  the  revolutionary  national  com- 
mittee to  see  the  necessity  of  Socialism.  And  even  when 
they  do  see  it  they  will  probably  regard  it  as  simply  a  tem- 
porary remedy  and  think  that  conditions  after  a  while  will 
simmer  down  so  that  we  may  go  back  to  the  old  times  of 
competition  and  private  ownership. 

Now  when  it  becomes  necessary  to  give  bread  to  the 
workers  in  New  York  city,  the  wheat  of  Minnesota  must  be 
requisitioned,  elevators  must  be  operated  to  transfer  the 
wheat  from  boats  to  cars,  and  Vanderbilt's  railways  taken  and 
operated  by  the  Government,  as  in  war  time,  to  bring  it  to 
the  Atlantic.  This  will  be  at  the  final  stage  of  the  crisis,  when 
trying  to  feed  the  people  with  the  machinery  of  production 
under  private  guidance  has  proved  a  failure  and  the  Govern- 
ment is  forced  to  take  over  the  machinery  itself.  It  is  true 
that  this  event  may  be  looked  upon  as  a  mere  temporary  affair, 
such  as  the  taking  over  of  a  railway  in  the  Civil  War,  but 
there  will  never  come  a  time  when  the  steps  can  be  retraced 
and  private  ownership  restored.  This,  to  me,  is  the  likely 
course  of  the  revolutionary  process  by  which  we  will  be  landed 
into  Socialism. 

I  think  we  will  never  have  Socialism  until  the  workers  of 
the  nation  become  conscious  of  being  a  class,  and  a  disin- 
herited class,  and  until,  as  the  result  of  this  consciousness, 
they  struggle  as  a  class  for  the  institution  of  a  new  era  in 
which  they  will  be  equal  participators  with  all  at  the  festal 
board  of  humanity.  But  I  do  not  think  the  working  class 
will  become  class-conscious  until,  in  the  course  of  economic 
evolution,  material  conditions  have  prepared  the  ground  for 


212  Socialism  Inevitable 

this  consciousness  to  manifest  itself.  The  chicken's  brain 
is  not  developed  until  after  its  body  nor  until  it  is  physically 
ready  to  emerge  from  its  shell  and  live  a  new  life.  But  the 
very  economic  conditions  which  develop  the  class-conscious- 
ness of  the  poor  also  develop  the  class-consciousness  of  the 
rich.  When  the  poor  realize  that  the  present  competitive 
system  means  death  to  society,  the  rich  also  will  realize  it, 
and  will  see  the  necessity  of  surrendering  to  the  inevitable. 

It  is  true  that  inasmuch  as  the  poor  are  in  the  vast 
numerical  majority,  it  may  be  argued  that  even  if  the  rich 
do  not  peaceably  surrender  they  can  be  forced  to  do  so  by 
the  superior  power  of  the  poor.  True  enough,  but  that  the 
rich  should  enter  into  a  hopeless  struggle  against  both  the 
Will  of  Man  and  the  Will  of  God  is  too  insane  an  idea  to 
be  entertained.  By  the  Will  of  God,  I  mean  the  economic 
development  of  industry,  for,  after  all,  when  we  say  God's 
Law  or  Will  we  simply  mean  a  progress  of  events  which  is 
so  in  the  nature  of  things  that  no  one  who  recognizes  the 
reason  of  the  progression  will  attempt  to  interfere  with  it. 
There  are  not  many  "Mrs.  Partingtons"  nowadays  trying  to 
force  back  the  tide  with  a  broom. 

We  Socialists,  who  hold  to  the  materialistic  conception  of 
history,  should  have  to  admit  having  formed  a  ridiculously 
low  estimate  of  the  intelligence  of  the  rich  if  we  should  deny 
the  possibility  of  their  recognizing  the  breakdown  of  the 
present  system  when  the  evidences  of  it  are  so  palpable  that 
an  idiot  could  not  fail  to  see  them.  In  short,  as  material- 
ists, we  must  concede  that  both  a  rich  man  and  a  poor  man 
must  at  a  certain  final  stage  of  the  progress  of  evolutionary 
development  of  society  see  the  inevitability  of  the  wreck  of  our 
competitive  ship  of  state. 

A  landlubber  may  not  see  any  cause  for  worry  at  a  certain 
sound  that  reaches  his  ears;  yet  the  captain  may  know  that 
it  is  the  sound  of  breakers  upon  a  reef,  and  that  his  ship 
cannot  possibly  escape.  The  lubber  may  not  know  of  the 
danger  at  the  moment,  but  it  only  requires  a  loud  enough  roar 
of  the  breakers  to  make  him  realize  the  situation  as  clearly 
as  the  captain.  If  he  is  in  the  steerage  it  may  be  that  the 
food  and  lodging  are  such  that  he  would  look  forward  to  the 
termination  of  his  voyage  with  more  impatience  than  if  he 
were  in  the  cabin,  and  might  therefore  see  the  shore  quicker 


Class  vs.  Class:  Kesultant  213 

because  of  his  alertness ;  but  even  so,  it  would  only  be  a  matter 
of  hours  until  the  man  in  the  cabin  would  see  the  shore,  be 
it  reef  or  dock,  quite  as  plainly  as  the  steerage  passenger. 

This  metaphor,  of  course,  is  not  exact:  no  metaphor  is. 
Perhaps,  if  I  had  used  the  word  galley-slave  instead  of  steer- 
age passenger,  it  would  have  been  nearer  the  mark,  but  even 
that  would  not  exactly  express  the  case. 

The  ship  of  state  is  not  being  propelled  onward  by  forces 
with  which  the  passengers  have  nothing  to  do.  Its  move- 
ment is  the  resultant  of  the  action  of  class  upon  class.  It 
becomes  socially  conscious  as  the  resultant  of  such  interaction, 
and  Socialism  will  result  when  we  become  socially  conscious 
of  its  desirability  and  necessity.  The  Social  consciousness  is 
the  resultant  of  the  class  consciousness  of  the  poor  working 
upon  and  against  the  class  consciousnes  of  the  rich. 

It  is  absurd  to  deny  that  class  consciousness  will  not  develop 
with  either  rich  or  poor,  or  that  the  two  classes  will  not,  as 
classes,  oppose  each  other,  as  it  is  equally  absurd  to  say 
that  there  will  be  no  resultant  as  the  effect  of  the  meeting  of 
these  two  opposing  forces.  The  resultant  is  the  social  con- 
sciousness that  will  make  us  realize  the  necessity  of  Social- 
ism. 

Those  young  beginners  in  Socialism  who  deny  the  neces- 
sity of  the  class  struggle  and  class  consciousness,  however, 
are  no  more  unscientific  than  the  older  heads  who  would  have 
us  believe  that  it  is  merely  the  class  consciousness  of  the 
workers  that  is  to  guide  society  in  its  final  movement  to 
Socialism. 

We  must,  it  is  true,  depend  ultimately  upon  the  social 
consciousness,  but  it  is  certainly  too  early  as  yet  to  rely  upon 
that  force.  The  two  classes  must  first  become  conscious  of 
their  position  and  engage  in  a  definite  struggle  with  each 
other.  Meanwhile  the  position  of  the  Socialist  must  neces- 
sarily be  upon  the  side  of  the  working  class,  even  though  he 
may  look  forward  to  a  future  where  there  will  be  no  classes 
and  no  class  struggles. 

The  class  struggle  is  necessary  to  develop  that  class  con- 
sciousness which  is  the  prelude  to  social  consciousness,  which, 
in  turn,  will  lead  society  to  welcome  the  change  to  Social- 
ism. 


214  Socialism  Inevitable 


A  WORLD  TRUST 

(November,   1904.) 

Boston,  Sept.  23.— A  dispatch  to  the  Transcript  from  Pitts- 
burg says  that  two  Pittsburg  men,  President  James  A.  Chambers 
and  Vice-President  M.  K.  McMullin,  of  the  American  Window 
Glass  Co.,  are  at  the  head  of  the  effort  to  form  a  world's  trust  in 
window  glass.  A  dispatch  from  Brussels  says  they  have  a  four 
months'  option  in  which  to  purchase  all  the  salable  glass  fac- 
tories in  Belgium.  When  Messrs.  Chambers  and  McMullin  went 
abroad,  it  was  with  a  view  to  making  an  agreement  to  curtail 
production  and  maintain  prices  at  a  profitable  point.  It  is  ex- 
pected that  they  will  return  to  Belgium  in  December. 

The  negotiations  with  independents,  co-operatives  and  workers 
in  America  last  spring  were  notably  successful.  A  short  lire 
has  been  secured,  as  the  plants  will  not  resume  operations  till 
November  1st.  All  surplus  stocks  can  be  absorbed,  and  prices 
maintained  at  the  present  high  level.  Last  year  the  window- 
glass  business  in  America  was  aided  by  the  Belgian  strike. 

I  take  the  above  from  the  Evening  Post.  It  is  always  a 
matter  of  wonderment  to  me  that  the  editor  of  that  staid 
old  paper  can  publish  such  an  item,  indicating  a  new  and 
remarkable  development  of  industry,  and  then  not  give  even 
a  line  of  comment  in  his  editorial  column. 

The  explanation,  however,  is  simple:  he  has  nothing  to 
say.  The  Evening  Post  for  many  years  was  the  leading 
exponent  of  the  laissez-faire  theory  of  political  economy. 
Give  us  free  trade  and  an  honest  administration,  it  said,  and 
the  social  problem  is  solved.  Hence,  when  the  trusts  first 
appeared,  no  paper  was  louder  in  denunciation  of  what  it 
called  the  "brigands  of  commerce."  Up  to  that  time  I, 
myself,  had  been  more  or  less  an  admirer  of  the  Post,  and 
persisted  in  the  belief  that  it  was  at  least  honest  in  its  wrong 
theories. 

I  was  soon  to  be  disillusioned.  In  1884-85  I  wrote  a 
number  of  letters  to  it  upon  this  subject,  showing  the  injustice 
of  blaming  the  capitalists  for  doing  what  they  were  forced 
to  by  the  inexorable  laws  of  trade,    I  was  not  a  Socialist  then, 


A  World  Trust  215 

but  had  sense  enough  to  see  the  absolute  necessity  of  the 
Trust,  which  meant,  to  me,  its  inevitability.  The  Post,  how- 
ever, refused  to  publish  any  of  my  letters,  much  to  my 
astonishment,  as  I  had  thought  until  then  that  any  communi- 
cation upon  such  an  important  subject  would  surely  be  pub- 
lished. 

I  have  learned  more  about  the  art  of  modern  journalism 
since  then.  The  newspaper  of  to-day  never  tells  the  truth, 
except  as  a  matter  of  necessity,  unless  the  truth  happens  to 
correspond  with  what  it  thinks  its  readers  like.  Now  at  that 
time  the  Post  thought  its  readers  wanted  the  trusts  de- 
nounced as  inexcusable  nuisances,  and  to  have  me  come  along 
and  offer  a  reasonable  excuse  for  their  formation  and  exist- 
ence would  make  the  demand  for  their  abolition  appear 
ridiculous.  As  it  could  not  answer  me,  it  took  the  shortest 
way  out  of  the  difficulty  by  suppressing  my  letters.  I  appear 
to  be  the  only  editor  who  always  stands  by  and  publishes  any- 
body's letter  on  any  side  of  the  political  question. 

A  Week  Later. — I  must  now  modify  my  criticism,  since 
the  Post  has  at  last  expressed  itself  upon  this  very  subject.  I 
copy  from  its  editorial  of  October  1st: 

The  rapidity  with  which  the  Trust  question  has  been  coming 
to  the  front  in  Mexico  has  been  plain  from  the  progress  recently 
made  in  railway  consolidation  in  that  country  and  the  total 
reorganization  of  the  country's  industry  upon  the  oasis  of  the 
"community-of-interests"  principle.  The  "small  producer"  is,  as 
usual,  putting  in  his  complaint  and  his  request  for  relief.  Mine- 
owners  urge  that  the  American  Smelting  and  Refining  Company, 
which  has  absorbed  most  of  the  mines  and  nearly  all  of  the 
smelters  in  Mexico,  is  now  closing  some  of  the  best  mines  in 
the  Sierra  Mojada  region,  in  its  effort  to  control  the  output  and 
the  price  of  ores.  It  is  now  stated  that  President  Diaz  is  con- 
sidering the  advisability  of  putting  a  check  upon  the  growth  of 
trusts  by  officially  prohibiting  them.  President  Diaz  may  learn 
a  useful  lesson  from  the  experience  of  the  United  States  Con- 
gress, which  prohibited  Trusts  by  the  Sherman  Law  with  such 
effect  that  by  1900,  according  to  Senator  Hanna,  "there  was  not 
a  Trust  in  the  United  States."  As  it  appears  to  be  American 
capitalists  that  are  causing  trouble  in  Mexico,  it  may  be  that 
the  Trusts  have  been  driven  to  that  country  from  the  United 
States.  It  will  be  interesting  to  see  where  they  will  go  when 
they  have  been  driven  out  of  Mexico  by  President  Diaz. 

Further  dispatches  attest  the  progress  that  is  being  made  by 
American  capital  in  competition  with  foreign.  Recent  announce- 
ments have  given  good  ground  for  the  belief  that  Americans  may 


216  Socialism  Inevitable 

prove  dangerous,  not  merely  as  sellers  in  European  markets, 
but  also  as  competitive  producers  on  foreign  soil.  The  most 
noteworthy  development  of  the  sort  was  seen  in  the  recent  pur- 
chase of  the  English  firm  of  Ogden's,  Limited,  by  the  American 
Tobacco  Company — a  step  which  has  aroused  serious  apprehen- 
sion not  merely  among  English  tobacco  manufacturers,  but  gen- 
erally throughout  the  whole  field  of  British  industry.  Further 
progress  in  the  direction  of  American  control  of  foreign  industry 
has  now  been  made  by  the  Glass  Trust's  acquisition  of  the  Bel- 
gian glass  factories  at  Charleroi.  While  the  Trust  has  not 
succeeded  in  obtaining  the  entire  ownership  of  the  factories,  it 
has  acquired  a  large,  if  not  controlling,  interest.  The  Trust, 
with  its  enlarged  scope,  will  now,  it  is  thought,  be  able  to  govern 
the  market  and  control  wages.  Taken  in  connection  with  other 
transfers  of  American  capital  to  foreign  fields  of  investment, 
these  two  encroachments  must  be  regarded  as  highly  significant. 
They  indicate  where  the  headship  of  industry  is  likely  to  be 
found  in  the  future.  They  will  be  a  source  of  disappointment  to 
those  who  have  laid  stress  on  the  difficulty  of  forming  interna- 
tional combinations  of  capital.  They  will,  however,  bring  new 
problems  to  the  attention  of  governments,  and  may  raise  the 
practical  question  whether  the  governments  themselves  are 
stronger  than  the  Trusts. 

The  Post  is  not  unamusing  when  it  wonders  where  the 
dear  little  trust  birds  will  roost  when  Hanna  shoos  them  out 
of  this  country,  and  Diaz  shoos  them  from  Mexico.  Yet  it 
is  still  more  amusing,  although  quite  unconscious  of  it,  in  its 
plaintive  query  whether  the  trusts  are  stronger  than  the 
government  or  not.  It  evidently  fears  that  the  trusts  may 
some  day  shoo  the  governments  away  and  roost  in  the  coop 
themselves. 

Let  me  assure  you,  dear  Post,  that  the  trusts  moved  in 
long  ago  and  the  governments  are  simply  their  tenants  at 
will.  You  don't  believe  it?  Well,  you  did  not  believe  me 
when  I  predicted  ten  years  ago  that  American  capital  would 
be  so  superabundant  in  this  country  that  it  would  be  forced 
to  invest  in  Europe. 


The  Death  of  the  Democbatic  Paety         31? 


THE  DEATH  OF  THE  DEMOCRATIC 
PARTY 

« 

(December,   1904.) 

IF  ever  the  Socialist  philosophy  was  justified  by  election  re- 
sults, it  was  by  that  of  November  8, 1904.  Political  par- 
ties are  merely  the  organs  of  different  groups  of  men  who 
are  more  or  less  conscious  of  what  they  want,  and  have  organ- 
ized to  attain  these  wants  by  political  action.  However,  just  as 
organs  in  the  human  body  will  persist  for  a  time  after  their 
reason  for  existence  has  departed,  so  will  political  organs 
or  parties  persist  when  the  day  of  their  usefulness  has  forever 
gone. 

We  have  muscles  to  move  our  ears,  although  we  have  no 
use  for  such  muscles.  But  there  was  a  day  when  our  remote 
ancestors  could,  and  did,  prick  their  ears  as  well  as  any  horse, 
and  in  those  days  ear  muscles  were  manifestly  a  necessity. 
Finally,  when  we  ceased  to  prick  our  ears,  the  muscles  grad- 
ually lost  their  power  of  contraction;  but  they  are  still  with 
us,  although  probably  diminishing  in  size  from  century  to 
century,  and  some  day  will  no  doubt  completely  disappear  in 
the  process  of  evolution. 

The  Democratic  Party  has  been  swept  off  the  political 
board.  It  is  true  that  it  remains  in  the  Solid  South,  yet  it 
lives  there  simply  as  a  makeshift  barrier  against  negro  domi- 
nation, and  as  a  convenient  crowbar  for  certain  politicians 
with  which  to  break  into  fat  political  jobs.  Neither  in  the 
North  nor  in  the  South  does  it  justify  its  further  existence, 
for  it  has  ceased  to  be  the  representative  of  the  ideas  of  any 
particular  economic  class,  and  nothing  else  can  justify  life 
in  a  political  party. 

When  the  Democratic  Party  was  the  representative  of  the 
slave  power,  and  of  the  agricultural  interests  of  the  South 
as  opposed  to  the  manufacturing  interests  of  the  North,  it 
had  a  right  to  live.  Moreover,  when  the  slave  power  died,  it 
still  justified  its  right  to  live  by  continuing  to  represent  the 


218  Socialism  Inevitable 

economic  class  in  this  country,  which  found  its  interest  in  a 
low  tariff,  as  opposed  to  the  high  tariff  demanded  by  the 
manufacturers  through  the  Bepublican  Party.  But  finally, 
with  the  practical  acceptance  by  all  classes  of  the  permanent 
economic  value,  under  our  present  competitive  system,  of  a 
high  tariff,  the  reason  for  the  existence  of  the  Democratic 
Party  was  once  more  in  question;  and  had  it  not  gained  a 
new  lease  of  life  by  taking  up  Free  Silver,  and  suddenly  pos- 
ing as  the  representative  of  our  rapidly  decaying  class  of  small 
capitalists,  it  would  have  died  a  natural  death  in  1896. 

However,  after  two  tries  at  the  Presidency  under  the  semi- 
radical  banner  of  Bryan,  the  Democratic  leaders  saw  that  a 
silver  brick  would  never  win  the  Presidential  game,  and 
decided  that  the  party  must  make  a  new  move.  The  Hearst 
wing  thereupon  cried  "forward,"  while  the  Hill-Belmont- 
Cleveland  wing  said  "backward."  Hill  won,  as  we  know, 
nominated  Parker  on  the  "safe  and  sane"  platform,  sent  out 
a  gold-brick  telegram,  and  backward  the  Democratic  Party 
went,  so  far  back,  indeed,  that  it  has  gone  out  of  sight. 

But  let  it  not  be  supposed  that  if  the  Hearst  "forward 
policy"  had  been  adopted,  the  result  would  have  been  ma- 
terially different.  The  Democratic  defeat  would  have  been 
as  great,  if  not  greater,  only  there  would  have  been  a  some- 
what different  lot  of  political  corpses  on  the  battle-field. 
Parker  sought  to  revive  the  old-time  Democratic  Party,  not 
understanding  that  the  reason  for  its  life  had  departed  and, 
therefore,  that  it  could  not  possibly  be  resuscitated;  and  the 
fact  that  he  got  any  votes  at  all  in  the  North  was  simply 
an  illustration  of  this  law  of  the  persistence  of  an  organ 
after  its  function  has  been  lost,  like  the  aforementioned 
muscles  of  the  human  ear  that  have  outlived  their  usefulness. 
The  Democratic  Party  is  like  the  turtle  that  walked  about 
after  having  lost  its  head :  it  is  dead,  but  doesn't  know  it. 

On  the  other  hand,  Hearst  with  his  programme  of  public 
ownership,  and  of  denunciation  of  private  wealth,  could  not 
have  attracted  a  much  larger  vote,  because  he  presents  no 
tangible  relief  to  any  particular  class.  It  is  true  that  the 
people  as  a  whole  are  probably  tepidly  in  favor  of  public 
ownership,  and  most  of  us  will  say  that  it's  a  scandal  that 
Eockefeller  has  so  much  money;  but  we  are  not  sufficiently 
exercised  over  the  matter  to  organize  into  a  political  party 


The  Death  of  the  Democratic  Party  219 

and  express  such  views  at  the  polls.  Why?  Because  the 
Hearst  programme  cannot  be  shown  to  lead  anywhere.  We 
have  poverty  among  us;  we  see  our  country  given  over  hand 
and  body  to  the  rich;  but  seeing  all  this  does  not  make  it 
clear  that  denunciation  of  the  rich  or  even  the  public  owner- 
ship of  trusts  and  railways  will  help  matters  much. 

Public  ownership  of  a  part  of  the  machinery  of  production 
simply  means  that  the  owners  of  the  part  remaining  in 
private  hands  will  reap  the  share  of  profits  that  formerly 
went  to  the  owners  of  the  property  taken  over  by  the  govern- 
ment. The  people  generally  who  are  not  owners  of  property 
of  any  kind  will  get  absolutely  no  benefit  from  the  Hearst 
programme  of  public  ownership. 

What  is  needed,  of  course,  is  the  abolition  of  the  com- 
petitive wage  system.  Socialists  demand  public  ownership 
merely  as  a  necessary  basis  for  the  substitution  of  the  Co- 
operative System  in  place  of  the  Competitive  System.  We 
demand  this  change  in  the  name  of  the  propertyless  class,  the 
proletariat,  and  have  organized  the  Socialist  Party  as  the 
organ  to  effect  it  politically.  We  see  that  no  help  can  come 
to  us  as  a  class,  nor  to  the  people  as  a  nation,  for  our  economic 
ills,  except  by  the  complete  abolition  of  the  competitive  sys- 
tem, together  with  the  private  ownership  of  property  upon 
which  it  rests,  and  the  substitution  of  the  Co-operative  System 
based  upon  the  public  ownership  of  property. 

We  believe,  therefore,  that  the  Socialist  Party  has  a  sound 
and  logical  reason  for  its  existence.  We  have  a  distinct  class 
to  represent,  and  we  know  what  will  benefit  that  class,  namely, 
Socialism.  And  the  immense  vote  for  the  Socialist  Party 
shows  that  the  people  have  at  last  begun  to  recognize  our 
contention. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  Democratic  Party  represents  neither 
a  part  of  the  people  as  a  class,  nor  the  whole  of  the  people 
as  a  nation.  It  represents  nothing,  and,  therefore,  logically 
should  receive  no  support. 

The  Eepublican  Party  represents  the  people  who  wish  the 
present  capitalist  system  to  continue  and  to  work  along  as 
smoothly  as  possible.  Its  supporters  are  capitalists  who  look 
no  further  ahead  than  profits,  and  wage  earners  whose  ideal 
is  a  full  dinner  pail.  It  has  had  its  great  victory  because  the 
mass  of  the  people  have  no  idea  of  the  possibility  of  chang- 


220  Socialism  Inevitable 

ing  the  competitive  system  to  a  better  one,  and  believe  that 
if  the  present  system  is  to  continue,  then  there  is  no  better 
way  to  make  the  wheels  run  smoothly  than  to  uphold  the 
^Republican  Party. 

If  we  want  things  as  they  are,  therefore,  we  should  all  be 
Eepublicans.  If  we  want  things  as  they  cannot  be  and  should 
not  be  anyway,  let  us  cling  to  the  corpse  of  the  Democratic 
Party.  If  we  want  things  as  they  must  be  and  should  be, 
then  we  must  all  become  Socialists. 

This  election  really  for  the  first  time  gave  the  world  a 
good  view  of  the  new  Socialist  Party.  It  was  the  first  Presi- 
dential election  in  which  a  ballot  was  cast  for  candidates 
nominated  by  a  party  of  that  name.  And  it  is  significant  that 
what  is  practically  the  birthday  of  the  Socialist  Party  should 
prove  to  be  the  death-night  of  the  Democratic  Party. 


The  Two  Nations  221 


THE  TWO  NATIONS 

(January,    1905.) 

FOR  many  years  prior  to  1902,  a  certain  man,  Loud,  has 
represented  the  Southern  Pacific  Eailway,  and  Wells, 
Fargo  &  Co/s  Express,  in  Congress,  although  nominally 
representing  the  people  of  California.  Loud  has  been  notorious 
for  his  attacks  on  any  project  that  might  extend  the  utility  of 
the  post  office,  and  has  publicly  declared  that  it  would  be  a 
good  thing  if  the  post  office  were  in  the  hands  of  a  private 
corporation. 

He  not  only  antagonized  the  post  office,  however,  but  he 
incautiously  went  so  far  as  to  extend  his  antagonism  to  the 
post  office  employees.  They  wanted  fair  pay  for  their  work, 
and  would  probably  have  gained  their  point  had  not  Loud 
taken  it  upon  himself  to  defeat  their  bill.  The  result  was 
that  they  banded  together  and  two  years  ago  made  a  fight  on 
Loud's  re-election  and  defeated  him.  There  is  no  charge 
that  money  or  undue  influence  was  used.  The  post  office 
employees  simply  pleaded  with  the  voters  in  Loud's  district 
to  send  some  man  to  Congress  who  would  stand  for  labor 
instead  of  capital.  The  electors  responded,  and  Loud  was 
defeated. 

But  Loud  was  a  particular  friend  of  the  President,  and 
so  was  not  to  be  driven  from  the  public  crib.  He  has  now 
been  appointed,  of  all  men,  at  a  salary  of  $7,500  a  year,  to 
represent  the  United  States  at  the  International  Postal  Con- 
gress, which  meets  in  Rome  next  summer.  Loud  will  no 
doubt  inform  the  Congress  that  the  United  States  is  contem- 
plating selling  the  post  office  to  Wells,  Fargo  &  Co.'s  Ex- 
press. He  will  certainly  say  that  we  ought  to  make  such  a 
sale. 

The  temerity  of  the  workingmen  in  thus  taking  to  the 
ballot  as  a  method  of  obtaining  their  rights  strikes  President 
Roosevelt  as  most  unmannerly  and  dishonorable.  To  quote 
his  words ; 


222  Socialism  Inevitable 

The  letter  carriers,  both  municipal  and  rural,  are  as  a  whole 
an  excellent  body  of  public  servants.  They  should  be  amply 
paid.  But  their  payment  must  be  obtained  by  arguing  their 
claims  fairly  and  honorably  before  the  Congress,  and  not  band- 
ing together  for  the  defeat  of  those  Congressmen  who  refuse  to 
give  promises  which  they  cannot  in  conscience  give. 

Workingmen,  we  learn,  are  to  stand  politely,  hat  in  hand, 
before  their  servants,  for  a  Congressman  is  but  a  public 
servant,  and  to  plead  humbly  their  wishes,  bow  themselves  out 
with  an  apology  for  giving  trouble,  and  then  wait  results. 
If  no  results  come,  they  must  be  patient  and  not  presume  to 
send  some  one  else  to  Congress  who  will  be  more  open  to  sug- 
gestions, even  after  they  have  tried  the  bowing  and  scraping 
game  unsuccessfully  for  years. 

This  idea  of  Eoosevelt's  that  Congressmen  have  a  divine 
right  to  rule,  instead  of  being  merely  servants  to  obey  the 
public  will,  is  about  the  most  remarkable  utterance  ever  given 
forth  by  an  American  President.  Not  only  does  Eoosevelt 
object  to  political  activity  on  the  part  of  workingmen,  but 
he  is  especially  severe  upon  any  resort  to  violence.    He  says : 

But  when  any  labor  union  seeks  improper  ends,  or  seeks  to 
achieve  proper  ends  by  improper  means,  all  good  citizens  and 
more  especially  all  honorable  public  servants  must  oppose  the 
wrongdoing  as  resolutely  as  they  would  oppose  the  wrongdoing  of 
any  great  corporation.  Of  course  any  violence,  brutality,  or  cor- 
ruption should  not  for  one  moment  be  tolerated. 

Mr.  Eoosevelt  says  nothing  about  corruption  or  violence 
if  committed  by  capitalists.  He  has  nothing  to  say  about  the 
action  of  General  Bell  of  Colorado.  And  while  he  denounces 
violence  by  trade  unions,  no  matter  how  just  may  be  their 
cause,  he  commends  violence  if  done  by  a  nation  in  the  cause 
of  justice.  To  quote  once  more  from  one  of  his  public  utter- 
ances : 

There  are  kinds  of  peace  which  are  highly  undesirable,  which 
are  in  the  long  run  as  destructive  as  any  war.  Tyrants  and 
oppressors  have  many  times  made  a  wilderness  and  called  it  peace. 
Many  times  peoples  who  were  slothful  or  timid  or  shortsighted, 
who  had  been  enervated  by  ease  or  luxury,  or  misled  by  false 
teachings,  have  shrunk  in  unmanly  fashion  from  doing  duty  that 
was  stern  and  that  needed  self-sacrifice,  and  have  sought  to  hide 
from  their  own  minds  their  shortcomings,  their  ignoble  motives, 
by  calling  them  love  of  peace.    The  peace  of  tyrannous  terror, 


The  Two  Nations  223 

the  peace  of  craven  weakness,  the  peace  of  injustice,  all  these 
should  be  shunned  as  we  shun  unrighteous  war.  The  goal  to 
set  before  us  as  a  nation,  the  goal  which  should  be  set  before  all 
mankind,  is  the  attainment  of  the  peace  of  justice,  of  the  peace 
which  comes  when  each  nation  is  not  merely  safeguarded  in  its 
own  rights,  but  scrupulously  recognizes  and  performs  its  duty 
toward  others.  Generally  peace  tells  for  righteousness;  but  if 
there  is  conflict  between  the  two,  then  our  fealty  is  due  first  to 
the  cause  of  righteousness.  Unrighteous  wars  are  common,  and 
unrighteous  peace  is  rare;  but  both  should  be  shunned.  The 
right  of  freedom  and  the  responsibility  for  the  exercise  of  that 
right  cannot  be  divorced.  One  of  our  great  poets  has  well  and 
finely  said  that  freedom  is  not  a  gift  that  tarries  long  in  the 
hands  of  cowards. 

Why  do  nations  fight  ?  Usually  because  one  nation  thinks 
it  will  experience  an  economic  gain  by  resorting  to  violence. 
Because  it  thinks,  or  at  any  rate  alleges  it  thinks,  that  justice 
will  not  prevail  unless  it  goes  to  war.  There  was  never  a 
war  where  both  belligerents  did  not  stoutly  maintain  that  they 
were  fighting  for  justice,  and  in  most  cases  the  onlooker  finds 
it  a  difficult  problem  to  decide  which,  if  either,  is  in  the 
right. 

When  we  look  at  the  two  nations  within  each  and  every 
nation,  however,  the  nation  of  the  rich  and  the  nation  of  the 
poor,  we  never  can  have  any  doubt  as  to  which  is  the  op- 
pressed and  which  the  oppressor,  as  to  which  does  the  work 
and  which  gets  the  reward.  Yet  the  fact  that  both  rich  and 
poor  live  within  the  same  national  borders  blinds  the  sense 
of  justice  in  many.  If  all  the  rich  Americans  lived  abroad, 
as  do  William  Waldorf  Astor,  W.  K.  Vanderbilt,  the  Countess 
de  Castellane,  and  other  well-known  members  of  the  various 
"American  colonies,"  no  doubt  these  blind  ones  might  see 
that  we  have  a  nation  of  poor  Americans  who  are  subject  to 
a  nation  of  rich  Americans.  Suppose  all  our  rich  did 
emigrate,  although  still  keeping  their  property  and  taking 
their  rents  and  dividends,  I  would  like  to  ask  Mr.  Eoosevelt 
if  he  would  not  then  say  that  we  Americans  who  remained  on 
this  side  of  the  Atlantic  were  cowards  if  we  did  not  end  such 
a  "peace  of  injustice." 

If  it  is  plain  that  we  would  be  cowards  in  this  case,  is  it 
not  equally  true  we  are  cowards  to-day  in  submitting  to  a 
"peace  of  craven  weakness,  this  peace  of  injustice,"  when  we 
know  that  its  continuance  means  that  thousands  of  our  fellow- 


224  Socialism  Inevitable 

countrymen  must  work  and  get  nothing  that  other  thousands 
may  play  and  get  everything?  Surely  this  is  the  "peace  of 
injustice"  that  Socialists  are  warring  against,  and  if  the 
President  is  sincere  in  striving  for  the  goal  of  the  "peace  of 
justice"  I  would  counsel  him  to  begin  at  home  and  cast  his 
lot  with  those  who  are  warring  for  justice  to  the  Nation  of 
the  Poor. 


The  Inexorable  Trust  225 


THE  INEXORABLE  TRUST 

(February,  1905.) 

THE  Evening  Post  of  New  York  is  one  of  those  journals 
to  which  a  considerable  number  of  people  look  for 
guidance  in  their  political  and  economic  creeds.  It 
sets  itself  up  as  an  oracle  upon  all  theories  of  political 
economy,  and  especially  does  it  think  itself  "IT"  when  such 
subjects  as  the  tariff,  free  silver  and  trusts  are  discussed. 
I  am  bound  to  say  that  its  views  are  usually  stated  vigorously 
and  to  the  point,  and  that  it  is  not  always  wrong.  However, 
upon  the  really  vital  question  of  the  hour — the  trusts — it 
hides  itself  in  a  cloud  of  words  so  that  no  man  can  tell  where 
it  stands,  except  that  it  thinks  the  disease  is  not  so  very  bad, 
and  that  the  best  course  would  be  to  forego  doctoring  and  let 
it  wear  itself  out.  Now,  this  is  not  a  bad  program,  provided 
the  patient  doesn't  die  before  the  disease  wears  out;  but  upon 
such  a  contingency  the  Post  utters  no  warning. 

As  to  the  probability  of  the  Trust  wearing  itself  out  with 
old  age  I  would  like  to  call  the  attention  of  the  Post  to  the 
following  item  taken  from  its  columns  of  a  recent  issue : 

The  "irrepressible  conflict,"  as  one  dealer  termed  it,  which  is 
taking  place  between  the  International  Salt  Company  and  the 
independent  producers,  has  resulted  not  only  in  forcing  the  price 
far  below  the  cost  of  production,  with  a  consequent  overproduc- 
tion of  about  100  per  cent.,  but  in  convincing  the  independents 
that  they  cannot  engage  in  a  campaign  of  the  survival  of  the 
fittest  unless  they  organize  themselves.  There  is  just  now  a 
great  deal  of  talk  among  them  of  conferring  with  the  Interna- 
tional Company  for  the  purpose  of  making  some  sort  of  deal 
as  to  prices.  But,  as  it  was  pointed  out  by  a  leading  manufac- 
turer in  this  city,  there  is  little  hope  of  success  even  after  a 
so-called  organization  of  independents.  When  he  was  asked  why, 
he  replied: 

"For  the  very  simple  reason  that  some  one  in  the  organization 
is  always  ready  to  cut  the  price  to  get  more  than  his  share  of 
the  tonnage.  That  is  history.  It  is  a  fact  that  there  have  been 
times  when,  at  meetings  of  salt  men  to  decide  upon  prices,  some 
have  not  even  waited  for  the  meeting  to  close  before  going  out 
to  telegraph  their  houses  to  cut  the  prices  just  agreed  upon. 


226  Socialism  Inevitable 

"The  International  Company  is  the  aggressor  in  the  campaign, 
and  there  is  little  doubt  in  my  mind  that  it  is  at  the  bottom  of 
this  week's  reduction  of  price,  salt  having  declined  to  $1.50  per 
ton  at  the  works,  a  drop  of  about  30  cents.  One  advantage  the 
International  has  over  the  independents  is  that  it  supplies  certain 
trades  with  mined  salt,  as  well  as  producing  evaporated  salt,  and 
it  controls  all  the  mines  in  operation  in  New  York  State.  Also, 
it  has  large  interests  in  the  salt  regions  of  Michigan,  Kansas  and 
Texas,  where  the  independents  do  not  enter. 

"The  Michigan  salt,  however,  is  of  inferior  grade,  and  while 
it  may  be  unloaded  upon  the  East  in  such  a  way  as  to  demoralize 
prices,  it  can  do  so  only  for  a  brief  time,  owing  to  its  quality,  or 
lack  of  it.  The  Michigan,  Kansas  and  Texas  stations  can  supply 
the  Central  West,  and  the  International  establishments  at  Wat- 
kins  Glen,  Ithaca  and  Warsaw,  New  York,  are  sufficiently  great 
to  supply  the  Eastern  seaboard  and  the  Middle  States.  As  for 
the  independents,  their  large  evaporating  plants  at  Akron,  Wads- 
worth  and  Cleveland,  Ohio,  and  Watkins,  Leroy  and  Perry,  New 
York,  place  them  in  a  position  to  supply  the  entire  Eastern  trade 
and  that  of  the  Middle  States. 

"So  the  situation  is  this:  There  are  two  factors  capable  of 
supplying  the  trade  east  of  the  Mississippi,  and  each  is  doing 
what  it  can  to  supply  it.  The  consequence  is  an  overproduction 
of  about  100  per  cent,  and  a  very  natural  drop  in  the  price.  What 
remains  to  be  seen  now  is  how  long  the  independents  can  stand 
the  pace.  With  its  profits  on  mined  salt  the  International  can 
probably  pay  the  interest  on  its  bonds,  and  it  would  seem,  there- 
fore, that  this  company  is  in  a  position  to  fight  the  fight  on 
these  lines  if  it  takes  all  winter.  The  independents  do  not  hope 
to  accomplish  anything  unless  they  get  together  and  that  very 
close  and  very  earnestly." 

The  International  Salt  Company,  which  has  offices  at  170 
Broadway,  is  incorporated  under  New  Jersey  laws  with  a  capital 
stock  of  $30,000,000.  It  has  acquired  the  securities  of  the  National 
Salt  Company  and  its  constituent  concerns,  and  of  the  Retsof 
Mining  Company,  miners  of  rock  salt.  It  also  controls  the  In- 
ternational Salt  Company  of  Illinois. 

Without  dwelling  upon  this  illogical  absurdity  which  has 
it  that  the  low  price  of  salt  has  resulted  in  a  consequent 
overproduction,  instead  of  the  very  reverse  being  the  case,  I 
would  like  the  Post  to  point  out  any  other  possible  solution  to 
what  it  calls  the  "irrepressible  conflict"  than  the  final  birth 
of  a  Salt  Trust. 

It  must  be  remembered  that  the  capitalists  engaged  m  the 
salt  business  are  engaged  therein,  not  for  the  purpose  of 
giving  the  dear  public  salt,  as  our  political  economists  would 
have  us  believe,  but  for  the  purpose  of  making  money.  If  it 
happens  that  they  can  earn  more  money  by  not  making  salt 


The  Inexorable  Trust  227 

than  by  continuing  its  production,  then  it  won't  take  them 
long  to  shut  down  their  mines. 

There  is  now  more  salt  being  produced  than  the  public 
can  buy,  even  when  it  is  sold  at  less  than  cost.  Some  people, 
of  course,  would  have  us  believe  that  there  is  never  over- 
production of  a  commodity  when  the  selling  price  is  not 
placed  too  much  above  cost.  They  seem  to  think  the  public 
buy  upon  the  plan  of  paying  only  a  fair  profit,  and  that  when 
the  price  is  fixed  at  this  figure  the  public  will  buy  unlimited 
quantities;  in  fact  just  as  much  as  is  produced.  Of  course 
this  is  all  rubbish.  The  public  buy  as  little  as  they  can  get 
along  with.  I  want  just  so  much  salt  on  my  potatoes,  and  if 
salt  were  ten  cents  a  ton  I  would  not  use  a  pinch  more 
because  it  was  cheap. 

However,  there  is  a  capacity  in  our  salt  mines  to  give  us 
more  salt  in  a  week  than  we  can  use  in  a  week.  The  salt 
was  put  in  those  mines  to  last  man  on  this  earth  for  the 
next  million  years ;  so  that  we  can  easily  produce  beyond  our 
needs.  The  salt  manufacturers,  in  fact,  are  not  concerned 
with  the  next  million  years ;  they  can  make  money  only  by 
mining  salt  right  now  in  the  Year  of  Our  Lord  1905,  and 
mine  it  they  will  if  every  man  jack  of  them  goes  bankrupt, 
unless  they  can  come  to  an  agreement  which  will  result  in 
their  making  just  as  much  money  by  reducing  the  output. 
The  Post  may  say,  "Very  well,  let  the  Kilkenny  salt  cats 
compete  themselves  to  death;  the  community  is  the  gainer, 
and  the  sooner  such  fools  are  off  the  earth  the  better."  But 
it  must  be  remembered  that  it's  only  the  little  salt  fools  that 
are  exterminated;  and  the  big  International  Salt  Company, 
which  is  the  aggressor  in  the  struggle  now  going  on,  wishes 
this  very  result.  When  the  fight  is  over  it  will  be  the  sole 
survivor,  and  salt  will  be  a  commodity  the  mining  of  which 
will  be  a  monopoly  resting  entirely  in  its  hands. 

Now  I  should  like  to  ask  the  omniscient  Post  if  this  is  not 
an  absolutely  necessary  outcome  if  the  existing  struggle  be 
persisted  in;  and  if  so,  wherein  lies  its  solution  of  the  Trust 
problem?  Let  the  Trust  wear  itself  out?  That  is  absurd, 
for  the  Trust  is  the  result  of  entirely  natural  conditions,  and 
can  no  more  wear  itself  out  than  ice  can  melt  when  the 
thermometer  remains  below  zero. 


228  Socialism  Inevitable 


THE  RIGHTS  OF  A  WHEELBARROW 

(March,  1905.) 

THE  way  the  President  is  absorbing  the  spirit  of  the 
times  and  the  rapidity  with  which  he  is  moving  to- 
ward the  Socialist  position,  is  a  gauge  from  which  we 
may  learn  how  quickly  the  whole  nation  is  changing  to  a  new 
viewpoint. 

The  President  speaks  of  "organized"  capital  and  "organ- 
ized" labor.     What  does  he  really  mean? 

What  is  capital?  A  wheelbarrow  is  capital.  What  is 
organized  capital.  A  number  of  wheelbarrows,  or  cars, 
hauled  by  a  steam  engine  over  an  iron  roadbed  is  a  railway, 
it  is  capital,  it  is  "organized"  capital. 

What  rights  has  a  wheelbarrow?     Can  it  vote? 

What  is  labor?  It  is  men.  You  say  you  will  hire  labor 
to  build  a  house.  What  do  you  mean?  You  mean  you  will 
hire  men.  What  is  "organized"  labor?  It  is  men  who  have 
assembled  for  the  purpose  of  systematically  carrying  out  a 
certain  industrial  project. 

Suppose  you  were  cast  upon  an  island  with  one  wheelbarrow 
and  that  some  fine  day  the  wheelbarrow  should  say  to  you, 
"See  here,  young  man,  you  are  Labor  and  I  am  Capital,  and 
I  wish  you  to  understand  that  I  have  just  as  many  rights  as 
you  have.  In  fact,  I  have  more  rights,  for  I  have  the  right 
of  doing  nothing  and  being  kept  in  good  condition  and  well 
oiled,  while  you  get  nothing  unless  you  work.  You  have  no 
right  to  use  me  to  wheel  dirt  or  to  do  anything  else  until 
you  get  my  permission."  You  say  that  only  a  man  with  a 
disordered  brain  would  ever  seriously  think  of  a  wheelbarrow 
having  a  personality,  a  few  sticks  of  wood  and  an  iron  hoop 
as  having  rights. 

Very  well.  Then  let  us  suppose  that  a  ship  is  wrecked  on 
your  island  and  that  the  passengers  and  crew  endeavor  to 
simplify  the  problem  of  gaining  a  living  by  building  all  sorts 
of  ingenious  machinery.    In  other  words,  they  become  "organ- 


The  Rights  op  a  Wheelbarrow  229 

ized  labor"  and  the  wheelbarrow  is  transformed  into  a  rail- 
way and  becomes  "organized  capital." 

Now  you  who  laughed  to  scorn  the  idea  of  the  wheelbarrow 
asserting  its  rights  as  Capital,  what  would  you  say  to  the 
railway  asserting  its  rights  as  "organized  capital"?  Would 
you  consider  it  just  as  absurd  to  talk  of  the  rights  of  capital 
as  of  the  rights  of  a  wheelbarrow  ? 

Hence,  if  you  can  see  the  absurdity  of  the  rights  of  capital 
upon  a  hypothetical  island,  why  can  you  not  see  the  same 
absurdity  when  your  President  talks  about  the  rights  of  cap- 
ital in  your  own  country  ? 

You  may  explain  that  he  does  not  really  mean  rights  of 
capital,  but  the  rights  of  the  men  who  own  capital,  or  of  the 
capitalists.  I  ask  then  if  the  man  who  owns  capital  has  any 
rights  that  the  man  who  does  not  own  capital  is  not  entitled  to, 
and  if  so,  is  it  not  really  capital  that  has  the  superior  rights 
and  not  the  capitalist  ?  Suppose  the  latter  loses  his  capital  in 
Wall  street? 

August  Belmont  lost  the  Louisville  &  Nashville  railway 
over  night  last  winter  when  John  W.  Gates  made  his  famous 
raid.  Did  not  the  rights  which  he  held  by  virtue  of  his 
ownership  depart  with  the  capital  ?  Admitting  this,  can  you 
still  say  that  it  is  not  capital,  but  the  man  who  owns  the 
capital,  that  has  the  rights  ? 

The  President,  therefore,  is  not  wrong  in  speaking  of  the 
rights  of  capital,  for  capital  has  rights  which  are  very  superior 
to  the  rights  of  man.  But  when  he  uses  such  phrases  as 
"organized  labor"  and  "organized  capital"  and  puts  them  in 
antithesis  as  having  respective  rights,  it  means  the  near 
approach  of  the  day  when  men  will  inquire,  "Why  should  not 
Organized  Capital  be  owned  and  controlled  by  Organized 
Labor?  Then  we  will  have  no  more  of  this  absurd  discus- 
sion about  the  rights  of  capital." 


230  Socialism  Inevitable 


WHAT  IS  RELIGION? 

(April,    1906.) 

SO  long  as  commercial  success  is  generally  thought  to  better 
adapt  the  earth  for  man,  so  long  will  it  give  pleasure 
to  those  who  pursue  it.  It  is  only  when  the  com- 
mercial success  of  the  individual  becomes  incompatible  with 
the  welfare  of  the  race  that  the  pursuit  of  wealth  will  become 
unendurable  to  those  engaged  in  it.  It  is  freely  admitted  that 
a  great  deal  of  the  business  success  of  to-day  depends  upon 
the  limitation  rather  than  the  production  of  wealth.  A  trust 
insures  profits  by  its  ability  to  curtail  production,  but  this  is 
an  accident  of  business  rather  than  its  normal  course.  How- 
ever, accidents  of  this  nature  are  sure  to  become  increasingly 
frequent  as  the  capacity  to  consume  becomes  more  and  more 
limited,  compared  with  the  ability  to  produce. 

As  this  condition  of  affairs  becomes  more  and  more  evident, 
it  will  come  to  pass  in  the  natural  course  of  events  that  men 
who  have  formerly  been  devoting  their  lives  to  the  accumula- 
tion of  wealth  will  have  their  energies  diverted  to  the  socializa- 
tion of  wealth.  That  this  is  the  case  may  be  seen  already  in 
the  actions  of  certain  capitalists  in  the  United  States.  It  is 
said  that  during  the  last  year  more  than  $90,000,000  were 
distributed  in  various  benefactions  and  charities,  and  it  is 
well-known  that  Mr.  Carnegie  alone  has  given  away  altogether 
nearly  a  hundred  million  dollars.  Of  course  all  this  charity 
and  philanthropy  is  only  a  feeble  indication  of  a  social  ten- 
dency, but  it  is  a  very  striking  one  and  should  be  duly  appre- 
ciated. 

That  the  individual  can  attain  complete  happiness  only  by 
being  in  perfect  accord  with  his  environment  is  axiomatic. 
The  individual,  no  matter  how  harmonious  he  may  be  in  him- 
self, cannot  be  happy  unless  he  has  an  environment  which  is 
harmonious. 

The  boundary  lines  of  one's  environment  are  illimitable. 
A  rich  man's  house  may  be  pleasant  and  his  family  agreeable, 


What  Is  Religion?  231 

but  if  his  neighborhood  is  disagreeable  it  is  evident  that  he 
is  not  in  a  favorable  position  for  happiness.  Again,  though 
he  should  make  his  entire  neighborhood  conform  to  his  ideas 
of  beauty  and  happiness,  he  would  still  have  to  consider  the 
city,  and  the  city  cannot  be  happy  if  the  nation  is  unhappy. 
The  task  of  the  man  who  sets  out  to  beautify  his  environment 
can  be  ended  only  when  all  the  world  is  beautified.  The 
happiness  of  the  individual  depends  upon  his  being  in  harmony 
with  a  harmonious  universe. 

The  increasing  sensitiveness  of  the  nation  as  a  whole  was 
strikingly  shown  here  in  the  United  States  when  we  felt 
ourselves  impelled  to  demand  that  Spain  should  cease  its 
persecution  of  Cuba,  and  this  sentiment  was  one  of  the  factors 
which  finally  led  us  into  war.  The  same  thing  was  seen  again 
in  the  attitude  of  the  United  States  toward  Russia  in  regard 
to  the  Kishineff  attrocities. 

Socialism  then  in  its  higher  sense  is  the  science  of  placing 
man  in  harmonious  relation  to  a  perfected  universe.  Coming 
back  to  the  concrete,  it  is  evident  that  one  of  the  first  steps 
toward  this  is  the  harmonious  arrangement  of  things  upon 
this  earth  that  man  may  freely  participate  to  the  fullest 
extent  in  all  the  possibilities  of  his  environment.  The  Social- 
ist demands  that  the  worker  shall  have  what  he  produces  and 
sees  that  this  demand  can  come  only  through  the  institution 
of  a  harmonious  industrial  system.  But  this  attained  he  by 
no  means  considers  that  he  has  reached  the  end.  Socialism  is 
but  a  first  step  toward  bringing  man  into  a  more  perfect  re- 
lation to  the  whole  universe. 

There  is  no  greater  fallacy  than  to  assume  that  because  the 
Socialist  sees  that  man  must  be  fed  before  he  can  be  happy, 
that  he  therefore  imagines  that  the  mere  feeding  of  man  is 
an  end  in  itself.  Feeding  is  simply  a  means  to  an  end,  and  that 
end  is  the  greatest  that  the  mind  of  man  can  conceive— the 
perfect  relation  of  perfected  man  to  a  perfected  universe — 
the  birth  of  the  Super-Man.  The  striving  for  this  is  Religion. 
It  is  the  true  worship  of  God. 


232  Socialism  Inevitable 


w 


WE  FEED  OUR  BUFFALOES  BUT  STARVE 
OURSELVES 

(April,  1905.) 

E  Americans  are  all  right  when  it  comes  to  raising 
buffaloes,  according  to  the  following  from  the 
New  York  Commercial: 

The  buffalo  herd  in  Yellowstone  Park,  started  by  the  United 
States  Government  and  during  the  past  few  years  very  carefully 
watched  to  prevent  the  death  of  the  young,  is  increasing  rapidly, 
and  will  this  year  number  between  twenty  and  twenty-five  more 
animals  than  a  year  ago  at  this  time.  The  herd  is  in  excellent 
condition.  It  has  wintered  well,  and  the  calves  are  growing  fast 
and  appear  to  be  sound  and  strong.  It  has  been  the  wish  of  the 
government  officers  to  increase  the  herd  until  it  resembles  the 
old-time  herds  which  covered  the  western  prairies.  The  ex- 
periment of  propagating  the  animals  is  definitely  a  success,  and 
the  army  officers,  upon  whom  the  work  has  largely  devolved,  are 
correspondingly  pleased.  Major  Pitcher  of  the  United  States 
army  represents  the  government  in  the  park,  and  is  practically 
and  officially  the  custodian  of  the  herd. 

The  buffalo  don't  need  to  struggle  for  a  living.  Peed  is  good; 
the  valleys  give  them  splendid  shelter,  and  they  have  the  pick 
of  grazing  lands  over  which  to  roam. 

It's  certainly  very  funny  that  our  government  can  see  the 
advantage  of  feeding  its  buffalo  babies,  fixing  things  so  that 
"the  buffalo  don't  have  to  struggle  for  a  living  when  feed  is 
good  and  plenty,"  and  yet  when  it  comes  to  fixing  things  for 
its  voters'  babies  that  it  treats  them  so  badly  that  the  infant 
death-rate  in  New  York  and  our  other  big  Eastern  cities 
beats  the  world. 

If  the  government  can  see  that  a  buffalo  baby  needs  good 
food  and  fresh  air,  why  can  it  not  see  that  human  infants 
need  good  food  and  fresh  air? 

If  good  food  is  necessary  for  buffaloes,  why  does  Congress 
refuse  to  pass  a  pure  food  bill  that  would  give  men  good 
food  ?  It's  also  interesting  to  note  that  the  Federal  army  is 
used  in  this  case  to  protect  these  animals,  whereas  its  common 
purpose  is  to  slaughter  men. 


Is  Socialism  Puacticable?  233 


IS  SOCIALISM  PRACTICABLE? 

(May,  1905.) 

JEFOEE  deciding  whether  Socialism  is  practicable,  we 
must  first  define  Socialism:  '^oJj^ajUuOt^^ 
"Socialism  means  the  government  ownership  of 
pays,  factories,  land  and  other  instruments  of  production, 
j.  the  payment  of  wages  upon  the  co-operative  instead  of 
upon  the  competitive  system." 
\  In  other  words,  instead  of  allowing  Vanderbilt  to  own 
the  railways  and  charge  high  freight  and  passenger  rates, 
taking  the  profit  to  himself,  Socialists  say:  Let  the  people 
own  the  railways  and  fix  the  rates  on  the  basis  of  cost. 

Now  nobody  can  say  that  it  would  be  impracticable  for 
our  government  to  own  and  operate  railways,  since  we  do 
operate  our  postoffice,  our  lighthouses,  our  city  fire  depart- 
ments and  our  public  schools.  Excepting  England,  moreover, 
most  other  nations  already  operate  their  own  railway  systems. 
Is  our  American  government  less  competent  than  Italy, 
Germany,  Kussia,  Japan?  And  if  we  now  own  and  operate 
a  railway  in  Panama,  can  we  not  own  and  operate  one  in 
Missouri?  Furthermore,  when  we  do  operate  our  railways, 
can  we  not  charge  living  and  reasonable  rates  for  freight 
and  passengers  instead  of  extortionate  rates? 

But  it  may  be  said  that,  even  admitting  the  government's 
ability  to  operate  the  railways,  it  does  not  follow  that  it  can 
successfully  operate  a  match  factory,  or  a  cigar  factory,  or  a 
bakery.  I  cannot  see  why.  In  fact,  all  three  of  the  industries 
named  are  already  operated  by  certain  governments  abroad. 
Thus  Eussia  manufactures  matches,  Austria,  cigars,  and 
Italian  cities  bake  bread  in  public  bakeries. 

Now  granting  that  public  ownership  is  practicable,  it  may 
be  asked  what  good  will  it  accomplish? 

Socialists  want  public  ownership  because  it  is  a  necessary 
prerequisite  to  the  co-operative  payment  of  the  workers;  for 
with  Kockefeller  &  Co.  owning  the  nation,  how  can  we  have 


234  Socialism  Inevitable 

a  Co-operative  Commonwealth  ?  In  short,  to  have  co-operative 
distribution,  we  must  have  co-operative  (government)  owner- 
ship of  the  railways,  factories  and  other  means  of  production. 

Competition  keeps  us  poor  to-day.  One  laborer  competes 
against  another  for  a  chance  to  work,  and  wages  as  a  conse- 
quence are  always  kept  down  to  the  point  where  they  provide 
only  the  mere  necessities  of  life.  Under  competition,  in- 
creased production  benefits  the  capitalist,  never  the  laborer, 
who,  indeed,  is  frequently  displaced  by  the  machine  and  de- 
prived of  employment.  So  that  we  find  that  an  increase  of 
production  actually  means  less  product  for  the  worker,  where- 
as under  Socialism — co-operation — all  would  benefit  as  pro- 
duction is  increased. 

To-day  the  United  States  is  the  richest  country  in  the 
world.  It  has  the  power,  not  only  to  make  all  our  own  eighty 
million  people  free  from  want,  but  could  support  five  hun- 
dred millions.  Yet  what  do  we  find?  Ten  millions  of  our 
citizens  are  in  abject  poverty,  and  forty  millions  more  are 
in  the  constant  fear  of  poverty. 

Socialism  affords  us  a  plan  of  using  what  we  can  produce. 
Hence  Socialism  would  abolish  poverty. 


Viechow's  Cell  Theory  235 


VIRCHOW'S  CELL  THEORY 

(May,   1905.) 

THE  Tf ust  is  at  once  an  abnormal  and  a  normal  develop- 
ment according  as  we  may  look  upon  it.  It  is  ab- 
normal to  the  social  system  if  we  regard  it  as  a  cancer 
eating  out  the  heart  of  society,  abstracting  to  itself  wealth 
that  should  go  to  all.  It  is  normal,  however,  if  we  view  it 
as  the  natural  evolution  of  a  system  of  competition  which 
gives  to  the  greedy  rather  than  to  the  needy. 

The  Trust,  indeed,  is  the  most  perfect  engine  that  greed 
has  ever  devised,  and  as  we  have  been  striving  to  perfect  a 
machine  to  satisfy  this  greed,  it  is  little  wonder  that  we 
have  finally  invented  an  instrument  that  operates  so  auto- 
matically and  with  such  intelligence  that  we  are  terrified  at 
our  Frankenstein,  and  now  seek  its  destruction. 

It  is,  however,  perfectly  natural  for  a  man  to  become 
greedy  in  an  environment  that  threatens  him  with  starvation 
if  he  does  not  grab.  The  most  perfect-mannered  gentleman 
in  the  world  becomes  a  hog  if  failure  to  be  a  hog  means  death. 

Life,  in  fact,  is  merely  adaptation  to  environment.  As  a 
cell  in  the  body  is  repeatedly  bruised,  it  demands  more  and 
more  nutriment  to  restore  its  equilibrium.  At  first  the 
result  is  a  simple  inflammation,  but  as  the  inflamed  spot  is 
injured  again  and  again,  the  inflammation  becomes  chronic. 
Let  the  spot  be  further  bruised,  and  it  may  become  a  cancer. 
In  other  words,  the  original  cell  which  started  out  to  heal 
itself  from  a  temporary  mishap  by  taking  a  little  extra  blood, 
has  now  become  the  malignant  cancer  cell  threatening  the 
whole  body ;  in  short,  has  become  a  deadly  foe. 

It  was  similarly  that  Kockefeller  started  out  as  a  simple 
business  man  trying  to  save  a  few  dollars  to  protect  himself 
against  old  age,  and  acquired  the  habit  of  saving  money. 
Surrounded  as  he  was  by  a  sea  of  deadly  competition,  he 
made  deeper  the  channels  which  guided  the  protecting  dollars 
to  his  savings  bank.    More  and  more  money  canie,  and  at  the 


236  Socialism  Inevitable 

same  time,  more  and  more  was  needed  to  protect  himself 
against  his  powerful  competitors.  Finally,  however,  came 
the  trusts,  and  now  money  flows  to  him  in  a  volume  quite 
undreamed  of  even  by  himself — a  river  of  wealth  which  he 
has  neither  the  will  nor  the  power  to  divert. 

Eockefeller  was  once  a  healthy  cell  in  our  industrial  organ- 
ism ;  that  he  has  become  an  abnormal  one  is  not  his  fault,  but 
due  to  the  unhealthy  state  of  the  organism  as  a  whole.  To 
cure  Eockefeller,  we  must  not  apply  the  remedy  to  him  in- 
dividually, as  would  the  Republicans  and  Democrats:  we 
must  apply  it  to  society.  To  cure  a  boil,  we  do  not  get  the 
best  effects  by  local  treatment.  We  seek  to  build  up  a  de- 
bilitated system,  of  which  the  boil  is  a  mere  symptom.  Eocke- 
feller is  an  effect,  not  a  cause. 

To  Professor  Virchow  is  due  the  honor  of  having  originated 
the  modern  theory  of  disease.  His  views  have  been  briefly 
stated  by  Professor  Legge  as  follows : 

Until  Virchow's  time  it  seemed  to  have  been  thought  that 
disease  was  caused  by  some  foreign  substance  inimical  to  life, 
seating  itself  within  the  tissues  of  the  body,  and  thence  pro- 
ceeding to  conquer  by  degrees  the  whole  organism.  But  Virchow 
showed  that  the  process  had  been  misinterpreted. 

The  diseased  structures  of  the  body,  he  affirmed,  consisted  of 
cells  like  the  healthy  or  undiseased,  and  these  cells  must  once 
have  sprung,  as  do  all  cells,  from  others.  And  as  those  parent 
cells  can  have,  in  their  turn,  no  other  origin  than  the  original 
cell  out  of  which  the  whole  structure  develops,  it  follows  that 
the  cells  of  diseased  tissues  must  have  developed  in  the  normal 
way  from  the  cells  of  the  healthy  tissues,  "driven,"  as  Lord 
Lister  has  said  in  this  connection,  to  abnormal  development  by 
injurious  agencies. 

Thus  we  see  that  the  whole  theory  of  disease  is  pushed  further 
back,  and  that  we  must  look  for  its  origin,  not  in  the  diseased 
structure,  but  in  the  agency  which  caused  the  cells  of  the  diseased 
structure  to  develop  in  an  abnormal  way. 

Let  us  see,  for  example,  how  this  explains  the  morbid  process 
called  inflammation.  It  was  once  held  that  this  in  itself  was  a 
diseased  condition  of  the  part  affected,  and  that  the  appropriate 
remedy  was,  as  was  said,  to  "reduce  the  inflammation  by  treating 
the  local  symptoms."  But  Virchow  showed  that  the  efficient 
cause  must  be  an  irritation  of  the  local  cells,  which  causes  them, 
as  does  all  irritation,  to  increase  their  own  nutrition  by  sub- 
tracting from  the  blood  and  the  neighboring  tissue  a  greater 
supply  than  before  of  substance  to  be  assimilated.  Henceforward 
the  congestion  of  blood  in  the  inflamed  part,  and  the  consequent 
nervous  and  vascular  disturbance,  become  a  matter  of  very  small 


Virchow's  Cell  Theory  237 

importance  for  the  cure.  To  find  and  remove  the  cause  of  the 
irritation  of  the  cells  is  now  the  care  of  the  pathologist,  conscious 
as  he  must  be  that  when  this  is  done,  all  local  symptoms  may  be 
trusted  to  cure  themselves. 

Now  just  as  it  is  the  function  of  the  scientific  physician  to 
seek  the  cause  of  disease  when  the  individual  man  is  affected, 
so  should  it  be  the  function  of  the  scientific  politician  to 
seek  the  cause  of  disturbance  in  the  social  organism.  And 
this  is  not  so  hopeless  as  it  might  seem.  The  scientist  is  not 
essentially  different  from  the  modern  man.  He  has  simply 
had  his  attention  directed  to  certain  phenomena,  and  by 
careful  study  and  observation  has  noted  the  relations  existing 
between  these  phenomena.  The  first  relations  observed  are, 
of  course,  very  obvious,  as  that  a  bird  has  two  legs,  and  that 
it  belongs  to  an  egg-laying  species  is  but  little  more  difficult. 
To  discover  that  a  bird's  bones  are  much  lighter  than  those  of 
a  non-flying  animal  of  the  same  weight,  however,  takes  con- 
siderably more  powers  of  observation,  although  it  does  not 
indicate  an  unusually  acute  intellect.  The  same  remark  ap- 
plies to  the  discovery  that  the  temperature  of  a  bird's  blood 
is  higher  than  that  of  a  mammal.  And  so  on  from  step  to 
step,  the  patient  scientific  investigator  adds  to  his  knowledge 
about  birds,  until  he  can  finally  enunciate  general  laws, 
which  seem  to  require  great  ability  on  his  part,  but  are,  in 
reality,  the  result  of  his  patience. 

To  the  ordinary  man  such  a  scientist  seems  a  genius,  but 
the  latter  has  no  such  exalted  opinion  of  himself.  He  knows 
only  too  well  that  it  was  by  taking  an  infinite  number  of 
short  steps  that  he  attained  his  eminence.  He  knows  that 
these  steps  taken  one  by  one  require  only  the  intelligence  of 
the  average  man,  and  that  the  great  scientist  is  merely  the 
ordinary  man  gifted  with  patience,  and  with  a  definite  object 
to  direct  his  steps. 

To-day  there  is  no  incentive  to  a  politician  to  acquire  a 
scientific  knowledge  of  economics.  It  is  not  to  knowledge  that 
he  owes  his  position,  and  too  much,  indeed,  might  easily  cause 
his  downfall.  Many  a  man  in  modern  life  has  come  to 
realize  with  Galileo  the  danger  of  knowing  too  much. 

When  the  church  had  charge  of  astronomy  it  was  heresy 
punishable  with  death  to  disagree  with  Ptolemy  that  the  sun 
revolved  around  the  earth;  therefore  the  astronomers  of  that 


238  Socialism  Inevitable 

day  were  not  very  eager  to  advance  other  theories.  There 
was,  in  fact,  no  demand  for  science  in  the  field  of  astronomy : 
faith  alone  was  wanted.  To-day  we  are  conducting  our 
politics  as  astronomy,  chemistry,  and  medicine  were  once 
conducted, — on  faith,  not  science — and  the  result  is  that 
modern  politicians  know  as  much  about  the  science  of  politics 
as  the  old-time  astrologers  knew  of  astronomy. 


Left  at  the  Evening  Post  239 


LEFT  AT  THE  "SATURDAY  EVENING  POST' 

(June,   1905.) 

With  a  suddenness  that  must  he  startling  to  those  who  note 
only  the  surface  of  events,  Socialism  has  become  a  factor  in  our 
moral,  political  and  industrial  life.  The  Socialist  vote  for  Presi- 
dent last  fall  attracted  a  good  deal  of  attention — more,  perhaps, 
than  in  itself  it  deserved — hut  it  was  in  no  way  a  measure  of  the 
importance  of  the  Socialist  movement.  And  year  by  year,  as 
science  compels  consolidations  and  co-operations  on  a  scale  im- 
possible in  the  past,  the  collectivist  proposals  formulated  by  the 
German  Jew,  Karl  Marx,  out  of  the  theorizings  of  the  great 
French  economists  of  the  eighteenth  century,  are  bound  to  re- 
ceive more  and  more  attention. 

Whatever  one  believes  about  it,  he  must  inform  himself.  For, 
while  Mark  Hanna's  prediction  that  Socialism  would  be  the 
storm  center  of  the  next  great  political  battle  in  this  country 
seemed  exaggerated  when  he  made  it  a  few  years  ago,  his  far- 
sightedness is  already  vindicated.  To  fight  for  Socialism,  you 
must  understand  it,  to  fight  against  Socialism,  you  must  under- 
stand it. 

WHEN  I  read  the  above  in  the  Saturday  Evening  Post, 
I,  naturally,  came  to  the  conclusion  that  Mr. 
Lorimer,  the  editor,  meant  what  he  said.  I 
thought  he  was  anxious  that  his  readers  should  learn  what 
Socialism  really  means.  He  certainly  says  so  plainly  enough. 
He  advises  them  that,  whether  they  are  for  or  against  Social- 
ism, it  is  necessary  that  they  should  be  properly  informed 
about  it.  Furthermore,  he  did  not  attempt  to  tell  them  what 
it  is,  and  thereby  rose  still  higher  in  my  estimation,  for  it  is 
a  wise  man  who  knows  what  he  doesn't  know. 

Regarding  Mr.  Lorimer's  editorial,  therefore,  as  an  in- 
vitation to  spread  the  doctrine  of  Socialism  before  the  eyes 
of  his  readers,  I  prepared  a  modest  little  advertisement  of 
Wilshire's  Magazine  for  the  Post,  and  requested  its  insertion 
at  the  usual  rates.    It  read  about  as  follows : 

SOCIALISM !    Bead  it  up !    Ten  cents  for  a  whole  year. 

.WILSHIRE'S  MAGAZINE,  New  York. 


240  Socialism  Inevitable 

To  my  surprise  the  advertisement  was  refused.  I  say  to 
my  surprise,  Because  the  same  advertisement  was  readily  taken 
by  other  magazines,  such  as  The  Outlook,  The  Independent, 
Success,  Public  Opinion,  The  Literary  Digest,  etc.  I  inquired 
for  the  reason  of  the  turndown,  offering  to  change  the  word- 
ing ;  but  the  Post  replied  that  they  "did  not  like  the  theme," 
which  meant  there  was  no  loophole  for  Wilshire  to  enter. 

Of  course,  all  this  is  merely  a  surprising  exhibition  of  busi- 
ness stupidity  by  people  who,  though  usually  considered  quite 
up-to-date,  are  so  out  of  touch  with  the  movement  of  the 
times  that  they  do  not  know  that  the  word  "Socialism"  is  no 
longer  a  bogy  to  scare  away  readers  and  advertisers. 

The  Post  did  not  reject  the  advertisement  because  it  is 
opposed  to  Socialism,  for  the  Post  is  not  opposed  to  anything 
that  does  not  affect  its  pocketbook.  It  simply  classes  the  word 
Socialism — or  the  "theme,"  as  it  calls  it — with  Hypnotism, 
Matrimony,  Astrology,  Clairvoyancy  and  other  such  words 
which  are  used  in  connection  with  certain  advertisements 
that  the  publishing  world  dubs  as  "bad  copy."  By  this  is 
meant  copy  that  tends  to  lower  the  tone  of  the  publication, 
and  causes  the  withdrawal  of  higher-class  advertisements, 
such  as  automobiles,  etc. 

But  the  Post  is  learning  things,  for  I  have  in  hand  this 
moment  its  edition  of  May  13th,  with  its  leading  editorial 
upon  the  Chicago  election.  It  is  certainly  significant  of  the 
trend  of  public  opinion  to  see  it  speak  so  favorably  of 
"municipal  ownership."  The  cat  has  jumped,  and  the  Post 
at  last  knows  which  way  to  run.  It  says:  "Voters  of  all 
cities  everywhere  are  ali  in  sympathy  with  Chicago.  The 
people  must  reclaim  their  streets."  It  will  some  day  say  they 
must  reclaim  not  only  their  streets  but  all  their  wealth. 

It's  a  step  from  municipal  ownership  to  national  ownership, 
and  only  another  step  from  national  ownership  to  Socialism. 

And  so  I  have  hopes  that  after  we  have  Socialism  the  Post 
may  let  me  use  the  word  in  its  sacred  columns.    Who  knows  ? 


The- Ten-Hour  Decision  241 


THE  TEN- HOUR  DECISION 

(June,  1905.) 

THE  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States,  by  a  vote  of 
five  to  four,  has  decided  that  the  New  York  State  law, 
limiting  the  workday  for  bakers  to  ten  hours,  is  un- 
constitutional. The  general  view  taken  by  the  majority  of 
the  court  is  that  such  a  law,  by  preventing  a  man  working 
as  long  as  he  chooses,  is  not  only  a  curtailment  of  his  liberty, 
but  is  an  infringement  upon  his  property  rights.  The  court 
assumes  that  a  man's  body  is  his  own  private  property,  to  do 
with  it  as  he  may  please,  and  that  any  denial  of  his  right 
to  use  it  for  more  than  ten  hours  a  day  is  virtually  an  in- 
fringement upon  the  divine  right  of  private  property. 

The  court  scouted  the  idea  that  the  bill  was  intended  to 
protect  either  the  health  of  the  bakers  or  of  the  bread-eating 
public.  Whereas  Justice  Harlan,  in  voicing  the  dissenting 
minority,  pleaded  that  the  bill  was  unquestionably  a  "health 
bill"  and,  therefore,  within  the  police  power  of  the  State, 
hence  that  the  federal  government  had  no  right  to  interfere. 

It  may  here  be  stated  that  eight-hour  laws  in  Kansas  and 
Utah,  limiting  the  time  for  miners,  have  been  declared  valid 
by  the  United  States  Supreme  Court,  on  the  ground  that 
more  than  eight  hours'  work  underground  is  unhealthful, 
and  that  the  States  consequently  had  the  right  to  pass  such 
laws.  It  would  appear,  then,  that  any  law  limiting  the  work- 
day must  show,  to  be  valid,  that  it  protects  the  health  of 
the  workers ;  their  leisure  or  pleasure  being  unimportant. 

This  is  a  pretty  fine  distinction.  I  have  no  doubt  that  if 
good  Justice  Peckham,  of  the  Honorable  Supreme  Court  of 
the  United  States,  should  be  compelled  to  make  his  living 
by  kneading  bread  in  the  ordinary  hot,  bad-smelling,  under- 
ground bakery  in  New  York  City,  he  would  revise  his  opinion 
that  ten  hours  of  such  work  are  not  too  long  for  one's  health, 
and  come  to  the  conclusion  that  ten  minutes  would  be  more 
than  enough  for  him. 


242  Socialism  Inevitable 

From  the  Socialist  standpoint,  however,  the  view  taken  by 
the  majority  of  the  Supreme  Court  is  sound;  that  is,  con- 
stitutionally sound.  The  makers  of  our  constitution  cer- 
tainly never  thought  of  any  such  future  for  this  country,  as 
is  seen  to-day,  where  the  lack  of  ownership  of  property  would 
make  the  mass  of  the  people  dependent  upon  a  small  class  of 
landlords. 

In  former  days  land  was  the  only  property  of  any  account, 
and  yet  it  could  be  had  on  the  western  frontier  for  the  ask- 
ing. Therefore,  if  a  man  did  not  like  the  wages  prescribed 
by  his  employer,  he  could  break  in  a  farm  on  the  public 
domain  and  become  his  own  boss.  Under  such  conditions, 
and  our  forefathers  thought  they  would  be  permanent,  it 
would  unquestionably  have  been  a  very  direct  infringement 
upon  a  man's  liberty  to  pass  a  law  preventing  him  working 
as  long  as  he  pleased. 

But  those  primitive  conditions  are  not  the  conditions  of 
to-day,  although  the  Supreme  Court  assumes  that  they  are, 
as  it  is  probably  bound  to  do.  To-day  not  only  does  a  small 
minority  own  all  the  land,  but  all  the  tools  necessary  to  work 
the  land  and  bring  the  product  to  market.  Hence,  even  if  a 
man  did  have  free  access  to  the  land,  which  formerly  was  the 
opportunity  of  all,  he  would  still  be  in  economic  servitude  to 
the  capitalists  who  own  the  necessary  machinery  to  work  the 
land. 

In  our  grandfathers'  time  the  "necessary  machinery"  meant 
an  axe,  a  hoe,  and  a  log-cabin,  all  of  which  were  easy  of  in- 
dividual production  and  ownership.  To-day  "necessary  ma- 
chinery" means  a  combined  reaper  and  harvester,  made  by 
a  hundred-million-dollar  trust,  a  hundred-million-dollar 
railway  to  haul  the  wheat  to  market,  a  million-dollar  elevator 
to  unload  it,  a  million-dollar  mill  to  grind  it  into  flour,  and, 
finally,  a  hundred-million-dollar  trust  to  bake  it  into  biscuits 
for  all  America. 

Now  it  is  self-evident  that  there  are  not,  and  cannot  be, 
enough  million-dollar  trusts  to  allow  every  man  to  own  his 
own  trust.  In  fact,  the  essential  idea  of  a  trust  is  not  so 
much  the  organization  of  property  as  it  is  the  organization 
of  men.  It  is  as  absurd  to  think  of  every  man  owning  his 
own  trust,  no  matter  how  much  wealth  there  may  be,  as 
it  is  to  think  of  every  private  soldier  being  a  general  in  the 


The  Ten-Hour  Decision  243 

army.  And  yet,  if  you  don't  own  your  own  trust,  you  must, 
when  you  wish  to  gain  your  living,  go  to  some  one  who  does 
own  a  trust,  and  beg  for  permission  to  use  it ;  in  other  words, 
you  must  beg  him  for  a  job. 

It  may  be  that  you  will  approach  the  Biscuit  Trust,  which 
will  tell  you  that  all  its  employees  work  eleven  hours  a  day, 
and  that  it  can  give  you  a  position  only  on  condition  of  your 
working  the  regulation  number  of  hours.  Hence,  as  you  are 
hungry,  and  no  other  trust  will  offer  anything  better,  you 
accept  the  conditions  and  work  the  eleven  hours  a  day.  But 
perhaps,  after  you  have  worked  for  a  few  years,  you  and  your 
fellow  bakers  organize  and  send  up  a  delegation  to  the  State 
capitol  and  succeed  in  persuading  the  legislature  to  pass  a 
law  limiting  the  workday  for  bakers  to  ten  hours  a  day.  Then 
suppose,  after  your  great  legislative  victory,  that  the  court 
should  set  the  law  aside  because  it  infringes  upon  your  right 
to  work  for  eleven  hours  a  day !  And  still  that  decision  might 
be  strictly  "constitutional." 

Now,  what  are  you  going  to  do  about  it?  It  is  stupid  to 
say  you  will  change  the  membership  of  the  Supreme  Court. 
The  judges  are  there  for  life,  and  none  resign;  anyway,  they 
have  only  said  that  black  is  black,  and  you  should  not  demand 
that  they  say  black  is  white,  merely  because  you  don't  want 
to  work  eleven  hours  a  day.  Or  maybe  you  will  think  of 
amending  the  constitution?  After  you  look  into  the  matter 
and  see  what  a  gigantic  task  that  would  be,  I  think  you  will 
likewise  give  up  that  idea.  It  would  be  about  as  difficult  to 
amend  the  constitution  of  the  United  States,  in  such  a  way 
as  to  make  a  ten-hour  bill  constitutional,  as  it  would  be  for 
Kockefeller  to  get  a  pass  into  heaven  from  the  Eeverend 
Washington  Gladden. 

But  you  say  you  must  find  some  way  out.  Here  you  are 
a  citizen  of  the  richest  country  under  the  sun.  You  can  pro- 
duce more  wealth  in  a  minute  with  your  modern  machinery 
than  your  grandfather  could,  one  hundred  years  ago,  in  an 
hour,  and  yet  your  Supreme  Court  says  no  matter  how  much 
you  can  produce  with  your  labor-saving  inventions,  you  must 
still  work  eleven  hours  a  day. 

If  there  is  any  labor  to  be  saved,  it  is  evidently  not  to  be 
your  labor,  not  if  the  court  knows  itself.  One  hundred  years 
ago  your  grandfather  worked  eleven  hours  a  day :  to-day  you 


244  Socialism  Inevitable 

produce  sixty  times  as  much  and  you  must  also  work  eleven 
hours  a  day.  One  hundred  years  hence  the  progress  of  in- 
vention may  quadruple  your  present  product,  but  you  or 
your  descendants  must  still  buckle  down  to  that  inexorable 
eleven-hour  workday.  You  know,  furthermore,  that  the  in- 
creased product  does  not  mean  increased  pay  for  you.  You 
are  paid  according  to  how  cheap  the  Trust  can  get  some  other 
fellow  to  take  your  place.  What  you  produce  has  nothing  to 
do  with  your  pay. 

If  you  are  a  baker,  and  an  automatic  kneading  machine  is 
installed,  increasing  the  product  ten  times  and  thereby  allow- 
ing the  Trust  to  discharge  nine  out  of  its  ten  bakers,  do  you 
think  the  lucky  tenth  man  who  is  kept  will  regard  it  as  an 
opportune  time  to  ask  for  more  pay?  Not  when  he  thinks 
of  those  nine  men  just  let  out,  every  one  of  whom  wants  to 
get  back  at  any  wage  that  will  feed  him.  Indeed  you  may 
well  despair  if  you  look  upon  existing  conditions  of  trust 
ownership  as  permanent.  But  did  you  never  think  of  the 
possibility  of  a  change  from  private  to  public  ownership  ? 


Distribution  the  Problem  245 


DISTRIBUTION  THE  PROBLEM 

(July,   1905.) 

IT  is  especially  the  province  of  this  journal  to  publish  the 
fact  that  whereas  we  Americans,  as  a  nation,  have  made 
immense  progress  during  the  past  fifty  years  in  the  power 
of  rapidly  producing  wealth,  we  have  made  no  corresponding 
advancement  in  our  methods  of  distributing  that  wealth  to 
the  working  class,  who,  by  the  aid  of  modern  machinery 
produce  it. 

The  editor  has  also  not  neglected  to  point  out  that  this 
failure  of  the  working  class  to  get  what  it  produces  is  owing 
entirely  to  the  fact  that  it  does  not  own  this  machinery,  which 
we  may  broadly  define  as  our  railways,  steamships,  oil  re- 
fineries, steel  mills,  cotton  and  woolen  factories,  flour  mills, 
etc., — in  other  words,  what  we  mean  when  we  say  capital. 
And  of  course  we  include  in  this  broad  definition  of  capital, 
both  our  dwelling  houses  and  the  land  upon  which  houses, 
railways,  mills  and  factories  stand. 

These  various  forms  of  capital  are  to-day  owned  almost 
exclusively  by  certain  corporations,  which,  owing  to  their  great 
size,  are  essentially  monopolistic  in  their  character,  and  hence 
are  generally  known  and  designated  under  the  name  of  Trusts. 

If,  then,  the  workers  owned  the  Trusts  it  would  practically 
mean  their  owning  the  machinery  of  production ;  and  the  only 
feasible  way  this  can  be  brought  about  is  through  the  medium 
of  the  government,  the  nation.  If  the  government  owned  the 
Trusts  it  would  mean  that  each  and  every  citizen  would  have 
an  equal  and  joint  ownership  in  all  capital,  and  an  equal  right 
to  use  the  same  for  his  own  benefit,  without  the  necessity  of 
paying  rent,  profit  or  interest  for  such  use  to  Astor,  Rocke- 
feller, Eothschild  &  Co.  Hence  we  have  adopted  as  the 
shibboleth  of  this  magazine  the  words,  "Let  the  Nation  Own 
theJTrusie,"  as  expressing  in  the  shortest  manner  possible 
wKafwe  are  fighting  for,  the  reason  for  our  journalistic 
existence. 


246  Socialism  Inevitable 

Now  the  only  way  to  establish  this  ownership  is  for  all 
who  wish  capital  to  be  thus  collectively  owned  by  the  nation, 
to  assist  and  vote  for  the  Soeia-List-Earty,  the  only  party  that 
clearly  and  unqualifiedly  demands  such  complete  government 
ownership.  While  we  jnay_jwncede  that  a  parM:  ownership 
of  capital  by  the  State,  such  as  municipal  ownership  of  gas  and 
waterworks,  street  cars,  etc.,  and  the  national  ownership  of 
railroads,  is  somewhat  better  than  no  public  ownership  at 
all,  yet  we  unhesitatingly  declare  that  the  advantages  of 
such  partial  public  ownership  are  so  slight  when  compared 
with  complete  public  ownership  that  no  one  who  has  read 
and  fully  understands  the  foregoing,  especially  one  who  calls 
himself  a  Socialist,  can  justify  himself  in  voting  for  a  partial 
measure  when  he  has  an  opportunity  to  vote  for  complete 
ownership  through  the  Socialist  Party. 

Now  so  long  as  any  capital  whatever  remains  under  private 
ownership,  those  who  control  that  capital  can  demand  tribute 
from  the  workers  for  its  use,  and  thus  perpetuate  the  present 
regime  for  exploiters  and  exploited.  The  emancipation  of 
labor,  in  fact,  can  be  accomplished  only  when  all  capital  is 
owned  by  labor.  That  this  fundamental  proposition  is  quite 
lost  sight  of  and  misunderstood  by  such  advocates  of  municipal 
and  national  ownership  as  Mr.  Hearst  can  be  seen  from  the 
following  striking  and  suggestive  editorial  taken  from  the 
New  York  American,  of  June  7th: 

THE  WONDERFUL  STORY  OF  MODERN  PROGRESS. 

Somewhere  in  the  body  of  some  human  being  there  is  lying 
a  germ  that  will  produce  a  brain  able  to  emancipate  the  whole 
of  mankind  from  all  kinds  of  slavery  except  that  which  comes 
wholly  from  superstition  and  ignorance. 

It  will  be  the  brain  of  a  chemist,  not  that  of  a  warrior,  a  states- 
man or  an  artist. 

Human  slavery  exists  because  a  few  control  the  necessaries 
of  human  life  that  are  indispensable  to  the  multitude. 

Invent  a  scheme  by  which  all  may  secure  the  necessaries  of 
life,  and  money  will  no  longer  be  able  to  control  the  terms  on 
which  we  must  labor  for  food,  clothes  and  shelter. 

If  one  by  twenty  days'  pleasant  work  in  the  Spring  and  Fall 
could  secure  food,  clothes  and  shelter  for  the  year,  it  would  be 
hard  to  induce  him  to  labor  twelve  hours  a  day  in  the  Subway  or 
fourteen  hours  daily  in  a  sweatshop. 

Is  such  a  thing  possible? 


Distribution  the  Problem  247 

Certainly,  and  it  is  nearer  consummation  than  most  of  us 
imagine. 

A  hundred  thousand  of  the  .greatest  men  in  the  world  are 
working  along  the  lines  of  such  a  discovery,  and  the  strides  in 
advance  they  have  made  during  the  last  twenty  years  have  put 
behind  them  a  greater  space  than  remains  in  front  of  them. 

Let  us  glance  at  a  few  that  have  come  to  the  notice  of  the 
people  through  the  daily  press. 

Production  of  butter  or  cheese  quintupled  by  the  selection  of 
suitable  cows. 

Chinchona  trees  by  selection  forced  to  yield  forty  times  the 
normal  amount  of  quinine. 

Wheat  and  corn  forced  by  selection  to  triple  the  product  of 
each  ear. 

Clover  and  legumes  by  inoculation  with  benign  bacilli  forced 
to  gather  from  the  air  ten  times  the  usual  amount  of  nitrogen. 

Fruit  pests  destroyed  by  other  insects. 

Germany,  short  of  fuel,  forces  her  soil  to  produce  twice  the 
common  crop  of  potatoes  that  will  secrete  four  times  the  usual 
amount  of  alcohol. 

Meat  and  other  foods  saved  from  spoiling  by  the  inventions  of 
Pasteur. 

Artificial  germination  of  marine  animals  by  Loeb. 

Percentage  of  sugar  in  cane  and  beets  multiplied  fourfold. 

Twelve  years'  needed  growth  of  an  edible  nut  reduced  to 
eighteen  months  by  Burbank,  the  greatest  living  man,  who, 
after  wasting  a  life  on  fruits  and  flowers,  is  beginning  to  devote 
his  gigantic  mind  to  lowering  the  cost  of  a  food  supply. 

Greatest  of  all— the  discovery  that  an  atom  is  not  an  atom, 
but  the  smallest  of  atoms  is  made  up  of  seven  hundred  electrons 
and  an  ion. 

A  few  common  elements  compose  all  things. 

We  know  how  to  make  a  beefsteak  out  of  a  barrowful  of  dirt 
and  a  few  tiny  seeds.  When  we  can  dispense  with  the  aid  of 
the  cow  and  make  the  steak  direct  out  of  the  sulphur,  carbon, 
nitrogen,  oxygen,  phosphorous  and  hydrogen  that  are  its  chief 
elements,  we  will  not  have  to  work  in  sweatshops. 

When  we  can  make  electricity  from  common  hydrocarbons 
direct,  we  will  not  have  to  pay  five  cents  for  a  ride  in  the  Sub- 
way. 

The  secret  is  almost  within  our  reach;  a  hundred  or  more  of 
the  chemists  have  it  nearly  within  their  grasp.  It  is  not  a  folly, 
like  the  philosopher's  stone,  but  a  certainty  to  those  who  have 
faith. 

What  will  there  be  left  to  do  when  food  and  shelter  are  prac- 
tically free? 

Plenty! 

There  is  disease  to  conquer,  vice  to  eradicate,  pain  to  eliminate, 
and  all  evil  to  be  put  out  of  the  world,  and  when  that  is  done 
no  doubt  those  who  are  living  will  find  something  to  be  looked 
after. 


248  Socialism  Inevitable 

Mr.  Hearst  seems  to  think  the  reason  poverty  exists  is 
owing  to  the  fact  that  man  does  not  produce  enough.  He 
looks  to  the  emancipation  of  mankind  by  some  heaven-born 
chemist  who  will  show  us  how  to  make  beef-steak  direct  from 
the  original  elements,  carbon  and  nitrogen,  without  any  refer- 
ence to  the  cow.  He  goes  even  further  and  says  that  no 
statesman  will  have  a  hand  in  the  emancipating  of  mankind. 

Now  this  is  exactly  one  of  the  points  wherein  we  differ 
from  Mr.  Hearst.  Already  chemists  and  other  scientists  have 
demonstrated  how  easily  we  can  produce  enough  to  abolish 
poverty;  but  no  statesman  has  as  yet  appeared  who  has  been 
able  to  tell  the  workingman  how  he  may  keep  what  he  pro- 
duces. 

Mr.  Hearst  says,  "Human  slavery  exists  because  a  few 
control  the  necessaries  of  life."  This,  of  course,  is  true;  but 
he  should  have  explained  that  the  few  have  this  control 
because  they  own  the  land  and  the  capital  whereby  these 
necessaries  are  produced.  If  Burbank  were  to  invent  a  walnut 
tree  that  develops  in  eighteen  months  as  fast  as  an  ordinary 
walnut  tree  does  in  ten  years,  then  the  owner  of  the  land  upon 
which  the  tree  is  planted,  makes  the  gain,  if  there  is  any, 
and  not  the  working-class,  which  owns  no  walnut  groves.  We 
say  if  there  is  any  gain,  for  we  know  that  competition  between 
the  owners  of  walnut  groves  will  soon  be  so  keen  that  it  will 
not  be  long  before  there  will  be  overproduction  of  walnuts  as 
of  everything  else,  after  which  the  only  gainers  will  be  the 
trusts. 

The  funniest  and  most  absurd  prediction  that  Mr.  Hearst 
makes  is  that  the  direct  production  of  electricity  from  coal 
will  reduce  the  five-cent  rates  on  the  New  York  Subway. 
The  American  has  printed  dozens  and  dozens  of  editorials 
showing  by  the  published  statements  of  the  company,  that  the 
cost  per  passenger  is  now  only  two  cents,  and  that  the  five- 
cent  rate  is  the  result  of  the  private  ownership  of  the  subway 
by  Mr.  Belmont.  But  if  the  direct  production  of  electricity 
were  to  reduce  the  cost  of  carrying  each  passenger  one  cent, 
does  Mr.  Hearst  think  that  Mr.  Belmont  would  be  more  likely 
to  reduce  fares  or  put  the  cent  in  his  pocket  ? 

We  do  not  wish  to  be  too  hard  on  Mr.  Hearst  for  this 
lapse,  for  we  know  that  it  is  an  error  of  one  of  his  young 
men,    Mr.  Hearst  is  now  in  Europe  and  cannot  revise  every 


Distribution  the  Problem  249 

editorial,  and  Mr.  Brisbane  has  so  much  of  his  time  taken 
up  with  the  Evening  Journal  that  he  cannot  look  after  the 
morning  edition.  Mr.  Hearst,  in  fact,  has  so  often  declared 
municipal  ownership  to  be  the  remedy  for  Belmont's  extortion, 
that  it  would  be  unfair  for  us  to  take  him  up  for  what  is 
evidently  a  mistake  of  a  sub-editor.  Nevertheless,  the  main 
indictment  against  Mr.  Hearst  and  the  other  advocates  of 
municipal  ownership  stands:  namely,  that  municipal  owner- 
ship itself  is  at  best  but  a  reform  measure,  and  does  not  touch 
the  fringe  of  the  problem  of  poverty. 

Poverty  exists  because  the  capitalist  class  own  the  machinery 
necessary  for  the  production  of  the  means  of  life,  and  thus 
make  the  working-class  their  dependants,  virtually  their  slaves. 
The  municipal  ownership  of  street  cars,  even  if  the  qity  should 
make  transportation  absolutely  free,  would  not  tend  to  abolish 
poverty  any  more  than  does  free  transportation  upon  the 
elevators  in  an  office  sky-scraper.  Free  street  cars  would 
simply  mean  higher  rent  in  the  suburbs,  just  as  a  free  elevator 
means  more  rent  on  the  top  floors.  The  landlord  skims  the 
cream  every  time. 

Municipal  ownership  of  street  cars  will,  of  course,  conduce 
to  better  service,  cheaper  fares,  better  wages  and  conditions 
of  work  for  the  employees,  and  to  the  elimination  of  the  cor- 
ruption of  our  Alderman  by  the  street  car  lobby,  and  especially 
to  the  education  of  the  general  public  in  the  control  of  an 
industrial  function.  All  this  is  to  the  good,  but  it  is  not  the 
abolition  of  poverty,  nor  is  it  Socialism ;  and  while  we  recog- 
nize and  admit  the  good  of  municipal  ownership,  yet  we  must 
at  the  same  time  point  out  the  impossibility  of  anyone  right- 
fully claiming  to  be  a  Socialist  who  votes  for  a  reform  such 
as  municipal  ownership  at  the  expense  of  the  Socialist  Party. 
A  Socialist  should  always  vote  for  his  own  party.  This  is 
the  only  way  for  him  to  make  a  positive  and  unequivocal 
declaration  that  he  wishes  to  have  Socialism  instituted. 


250  Socialism  Inevitable 


THE  MUTATION  THEORY  APPLIED  TO 
SOCIETY 

September,  1905.) 

WHEN  one  states  that  it  is  one's  theory  that  the  final 
move  of  society  will  be  in  the  nature  of  a  leap 
rather  than  a  slow  and  steady  progression  through 
the  successive  municipalization  and  nationalization  of  public 
utilities  until  all  wealth  is  finally  nationalized,  one  is  often 
condemned  as  being  unscientific,  and  no  true  follower  of  the 
theory  of  evolution. 

Now  to  be  called  unscientific  is  about  the  greatest  insult 
that  can  be  hurled  at  a  Socialist  j  but  at  the  same  time  he 
has  acknowledged  a  certain  justice  in  the  criticism  whenever 
he  feels  that  he  has  failed  clearly  to  demonstrate  that  the 
same  laws  which  govern  the  evolutionary  development  of 
plants  and  animals  also  hold  in  the  development  of  the  social 
organism  of  man,  of  society.  If,  for  instance,  it  be  admitted 
that  the  development  of  the  deer  or  the  elephant  in  its  present 
form  and  shape  from  lower  forms  of  life  is  the  result  of  the 
.slow  and  steady  progress  of  natural  selection  extending  over 
millions  of  years,  why  is  it  not  logical  to  insist  that  the  move 
from  the  present  competitive  man-eating-man  society  of  to- 
day to  a  state  of  brotherly  love  and  co-operation  must  also 
require  the  slow  progress  of  the  centuries  ? 

It  was  no  particular  comfort  for  the  evolutionary,  yet 
revolutionary,  Socialist  to  hear  that  the  researches  of  Geikie, 
Lord  Kelvin,  and  other  scientists,  showed  that  the  time  re- 
quired by  the  theory  of  Darwin  for  the  development  of  the 
higher  types  of  animals  and  plants,  time  mounting  into  the 
thousands  of  millions  of  years,  was  simply  impossible,  because 
for  the  greater  part  of  this  period  it  was  impossible  for  the 
earth  to  have  been  in  a  condition  cool  enough  for  life  to  exist. 
A  thousand  million  years  ago,  in  fact,  the  earth  was  an  in- 
candescent glowing  sun. 

Notwithstanding  this  objection  of  the  geologists,  however, 


The  Mutation  Theory  Applied  to  Society     251 

as  well  as  the  absence  of  certain  important  links  which  the 
theologians  have  not  failed  to  point  out,  and  which  Darwin- 
ists have  never  been  able  to  account  for,  the  scientific  proofs 
of  an  evolutionary  descent  were  so  positive  that  the  educated 
world  generally  became  convinced  of  its  truth.  And  now  all 
these  faults  are  at  last  to  be  remedied  if  the  mutation  theory 
of  progress  is  adopted  instead  of  the  theory  held  by  Darwin  of 
a  slow  and  almost  imperceptible  progress. 

Those  holding  to  the  mutation,  or  "jump"  theory,  think 
progress  from  species  to  species  to  have  been  made,  not  by  a 
slow  process,  but  by  sudden  and  unexpected  jumps.  Just  as 
if,  for  instance,  there  being  no  deer'ln  the  world,  that  the 
cows  of  a  certain  herd  should  suddenly  and  unexpectedly  give 
birth  to  a  number  of  young  animals  resembling  deer  instead 
of  calves,  and  that  these  animals  should  then  interbreed 
with  themselves,  and  so  give  rise  to  a  new  species — to  deer. 

That  species  should  have  originated  in  this  manner,  with- 
out apparent  reason,  would  have  been  as  difficult  of  acceptance 
by  the  early  Darwinians  as  the  story  of  the  creation  of  woman 
from  Adam's  rib.  Nevertheless  a  number  of  recent  experi-  , 
ments  upon  the  lower  forms  of  life  have  shown  conclusively 
that  there,  at  any  rate,  one  species  may,  byjifiing  placed  in 
a  new  environment,  give  rise  to  a  totally  new  and  different 
species;  and  if  this  may  happen  among  the  lower  species, 
there  is  possibly  no  sound  reason  why  it  may  not  happen 
among  the  higher. 

A  very  interesting  paper  was  recently  read  before  the  Koyal 
Society,  in  London,  by  Dr.  H.  C.  Bastian,  who  is  a  supporter 
of  this  theory  of  the  production  of  one  form  of  life  from 
another,  whereas  most  biologists  hold  to  the  hypothesis  of 
homogenesis,  or  the  production  of  a  given  form  of  life  from 
the  same  form.  Dr.  Bastian  has  shown,  however,  says  W.  E. 
Garrett  Fisher,  in  the  London  Mail,  by  an  experiment  anyone 
can  repeat,  that  one  form  of  life  does  at  times  give  rise  to  a 
totally  distinct  form,  under  the  influence  of  purely  physical 
conditions.  His  experiment  is  as  striking,  though  it  deals 
only  with  microscopic  and  lowly  forms  of  life,  as  if  a  hen's 
egg  were  found,  under  special  conditions  of  incubation,  to 
give  birth  to  a  duckling.     Says  Mr.  Fisher: 

When  the  eggs  of  a  common  "wheel  animalcule,"  the  Hydatina, 
which  is  found  in  the  stagnant  water  of  many  ponds  and  ditches, 


252  Socialism  Inevitable 

are  allowed  to  germinate  in  small  stone  pots  from  which  both 
light,  and  certain  invisible  rays,  which  seem  to  play  a  part  in 
the  process,  are  excluded,  Dr.  Bastian  finds  that  some  of  them 
invariably  give  birth  to  a  different  kind  of  animalcule.  The 
Hydatina  is  a  multicellular  organism,  which  belongs  to  a  class, 
the  rotifera,  holding  a  place  of  its  own  in  the  zoological  scheme. 
When  its  eggs  give  birth  to  the  ciliated  infusoria,  which  Dr. 
Bastian  has  obtained  from  them  in  many  instances,  we  have  off- 
spring of  a  perfectly  distinct  nature  from  the  parent.  These 
infusoria  belong  to  the  simplest  class  of  living  animals,  the 
protozoa,  each  of  which  consists  of  a  single  cell.  Their  bodies 
are  not  differentiated  into  parts  as  is  the  case  with  all  higher 
forms — including  the  parent  Hydatina — but  the  solitary  cell  has 
to  perform  all  the  functions  of  vitality.  To  a  biologist  the 
case  is  just  as  remarkable  as  if  a  cat  gave  birth  to  a  sparrow, 
or  a  hen's  egg  produced  a  frog.  It  is  a  clear  case  of  the  trans- 
mutation of  life,  corresponding  closely  enough  to  the  transmuta- 
tion of  radium-emanation  into  helium. 

To  the  lay  student  of  the  problems  of  life  this  remarkable 
discovery  has  a  two-fold  interest.  In  the  first  place,  it  helps 
us  to  understand  how  all  the  wonderful  varieties  of  life  which 
now  people  the  globe  may  have  developed,  within  the  somewhat 
limited  time  which  physicists  allow  for  the  operation,  from  the 
primordial  germs.  In  the  second  place,  the  fact  of  the  transmu- 
tation of  life,  once  established,  throws  some  light  on  the  ques- 
tion of  its  origin. 

That  heterogenesis  is  also  a  method  of  progress  among 
plants  is  being  every  day  made  clearer  and  clearer;  and  that 
the  same  applies  to  all  life  will  surely  be  accepted  in  the 
course  of  time. 

To  Professor  Hugo  De  Vries  the  world  is  most  indebted 
for  its  knowledge  of  the  facts  as  to  plants  in  relation  to  this 
profoundly  interesting  and  far-reaching  theory.  His  book 
"Species  and  Varieties,  Their  Origin  by  Mutation,"  marks, 
in  its  way,  the  greatest  step  forward  we  have  had  since  the 
publication  of  Darwin's  epoch-making  "Origin  of  Species." 
It  lights  up  many  of  the  dark  places  in  the  Darwinian  theory. 
As  the  author  says : 

A  grave  objection  which  has  often  and  from  the  very  outset 
been  urged  against  Darwin's  conception  of  very  slow  and  nearly 
imperceptible  changes,  is  the  enormously  long  time  required. 
If  evolution  does  not  proceed  any  faster  than  what  we  can  see 
at  present,  and  if  the  process  must  be  assumed  to  have  gone  on 
in  the  same  slow  manner  always,  thousands  of  millions  of  years 
would  have  been  needed  to  develop  the  higher  types  of  animals 
and  plants  from  their  earliest  ancestors. 

Now,  it  is  not  at  all  probable  that  the  duration  of  life  on  earth 


The  Mutation  Theory  Applied  to  Society      253 

includes  such  an  incredibly  long  time.  Quite  on  the  contrary, 
the  lifetime  of  the  earth  seems  to  be  limited  to  a  few  millions 
of  years.  The  researches  of  Lord  Kelvin  and  other  eminent 
physicists  seem  to  leave  no  doubt  on  this  point.  Of  course,  all 
estimates  of  this  kind  are  only  vague  and  approximate,  but  for 
our  present  purposes  they  may  be  considered  as  sufficiently  exact. 

In  a  paper  published  in  1862  Sir  William  Thomson  (now  Lord 
Kelvin)  first  endeavored  to  show  that  great  limitations  had  to  be 
put  upon  the  enormous  demands  for  time  made  by  Lyell,  Darwin 
and  other  biologists. 

From  a  consideration  of  a  secular  cooling  of  the  earth,  as 
deduced  from  the  increasing  temperature  in  deep  mines,  he 
concluded  that  the  entire  age  of  the  earth  must  have  been  more 
than  twenty  and  less  than  forty  millions  of  years,  and  probably 
much  nearer  twenty  than  forty.  His  views  have  been  much 
criticized  by  other  physicists,  but  in  the  main  they  have  gained 
an  ever-increasing  support  in  the  way  of  evidence.  New  mines 
of  greater  depth  have  been  bored,  and  their  temperatures  have 
proved  that  the  figures  of  Lord  Kelvin  are  strikingly  near  the 
truth.  George  Darwin  has  calculated  that  the  separation  of  the 
moon  from  the  earth  must  have  taken  place  some  fifty-six 
millions  of  years  ago.  Geikie  has  estimated  the  existence  of  the 
solid  crust  of  the  earth  at  the  most  as  a  hundred  million  years. 
The  first  appearance  of  the  crust  must  soon  have  been  succeeded 
by  the  formation  of  the  seas,  and  a  long  time  does  not  seem  to 
have  been  required  to  cool  the  seas  to  such  a  degree  that  life 
became  possible.  It  is  very  probable  that  life  originally  com- 
menced in  the  great  seas,  and  that  the  forms  which  are  now 
usually  included  in  the  plankton  or  floating-life  included  the 
very  first  living  beings.  According  to  Brooks,  life  must  have 
existed  in  this  floating  condition  during  long  primeval  epochs, 
and  involved  nearly  all  the  main  branches  of  the  animal  and 
vegetable  kingdom  before  sinking  to  the  bottom  of  the  sea,  and 
later  producing  the  vast  number  of  diverse  forms  which  now 
adorn  the  sea  and  land. 

All  these  evolutions,  however,  must  have  been  very  rapid, 
especially  at  the  beginning,  and  together  cannot  have  taken 
more  time  than  the  figures  given  above. 

The  agency  of  the  larger  streams,  and  the  deposits  which  they 
bring  into  the  seas,  afford  further  evidence.  The  amount  of  dis- 
solved salts,  especially  sodium  chloride,  common  salt,  has  been 
made  the  subject  of  a  calculation  by  Joly,  and  the  amount  of 
time  has  been  estimated  by  Eugene  Dubois.  Joly  found  fifty- 
five  and  Dubois  thirty-six  millions  of  years  as  the  probable  age 
of  the  rivers,  and  both  figures  correspond  to  the  above  as  closely 
as  might  be  expected  from  the  discussion  of  evidence  so  incom- 
plete and  limited. 

All  in  all  it  seems  evident  that  the  duration  of  life  does  not 
comply  with  the  demands  of  the  conception  of  very  slow  and 
continuous  evolution.  Now,  it  is  easily  seen  that  the  idea  of 
successive  mutations  is  quite  independent  of  this  difficulty.    Even 


254  Socialism  Inevitable 

assuming  that  some  thousands  of  characters  must  have  been 
acquired  in  order  to  produce  the  higher  animals  and  plants  of 
the  present  time,  no  valid  objection  is  raised.  The  demands  of 
the  biologists  and  the  results  of  the  physicists  are  harmonized 
on  the  ground  of  the  theory  of  mutation. 

The  steps  may  be  surmised  to  have  never  been  essentially 
larger  than  in  the  mutations  now  going  on  under  our  eyes,  and 
some  thousands  of  them  may  be  estimated  as  sufficient  to  account 
for  the  entire  organization  of  the  higher  forms.  Granting  be- 
tween twenty  and  forty  millions  of  years  since  the  beginning  of 
life,  the  intervals  between  two  successive  mutations  may  have 
been  centuries  and  even  thousands  of  years.  As  yet  there  has 
been  no  objection  cited  against  this  assumption,  and  hence  we 
see  that  the  lack  of  harmony  between  the  demands  of  biologists 
and  the  result  of  the  physicists  disappears  in  the  light  of  the 
theory  of  mutation. 

Summing  up  the  results  of  this  discussion,  we  may  justifiably 
assert  that  the  conclusions  derived  from  the  observations  and 
experiments  made  with  evening-primroses  and  other  plants  in 
the  main  agree  satisfactorily  with  the  inferences  drawn  from 
paleontologic,  geologic  and  systematic  evidence.  Obviously  these 
experiments  are  wonderfully  supported  by  the  whole  of  our 
knowledge  concerning  evolution.  For  this  reason  the  laws  dis- 
covered in  the  experimental  garden  may  be  considered  of  great 
importance,  and  they  may  guide  us  in  our  further  inquiries. 
Without  doubt  many  minor  points  are  in  need  of  correction  and 
elaboration,  but  such  improvements  of  our  knowledge  will  grad- 
ually increase  our  means  of  discovering  new  instances  and  new 
proofs. 

The  conception  of  mutation  periods  producing  swarms  of 
species  from  time  to  time,  among  which  only  a  few  have  a 
chance  of  survival,  promises  to  become  a  basis  for  speculative 
pedigree-diagrams,  as  well  as  for  experimental  investigations." 

Professor  De  Vries  finds  that  Lamarck's  evening  primrose 
is  at  least  one  flower  that  is  to-day  constantly  mutating,  that 
is,  its  seeds  produce  plants  quite  different  from  the  parent 
primroses,  and  of  a  different  kind,  and  that  these  new  prim- 
roses continue  the  deviation  in  their  progeny. 

This  conduct  of  the  primrose  seems  to  be  unique  among 
plants;  but  very  probably  when  further  and  closer  investiga- 
tions are  made,  other  plants  will  be  found  to  be  also  con- 
stantly mutating.  Certainly  it  would  seem  that  if  one  plant 
can  mutate,  all  can.  "  '         '  ■ •■■  > 

As  to  animals,  there  is  no  direct  evidence  that  they  have 
mutated,  that  is,  there  are  no  data  of  the  young  of  any  certain 
animal  being  so  different  as  to  constitute  a  new  species, 
whereas,  on  the  other  hand,  circumstantial  evidence  seems 


The  Mutation  Theory  Applied  to  Society     255 

to  point  to  a  development  by  slow  degrees.  Cows  have  cer- 
tainly never  been  known  to  bring  forth  deer,  for  instance, 
but  because  nothing  like  this  has  been  noted  in  the  present, 
there  seems  no  reason  to  think  that  it  has  never  happened 
in  the  past  or  may  never  happen  in  the  future. 

There  are  many  missing  links  in  the  chain  that  leads  us 
to  the  little  five-toed  animal  which  was  the  great-great- 
grandpa,  several  million  years  ago,  of  the  horse  to-day ;  and  it 
is  just  as  likely  that  many  of  these  missing  links  means  so 
many  mutations  in  the  evolutionary  progress  of  the  horse. 
That  is,  that  the  reason  no  links  or  steps  are  found  is  simply 
because  there  were  none.  Nature  may  have  skipped  a  few 
steps. 

The  theory  of  natural  selection  does  not  attempt  to  give  a 
reason  for  the  birth  of  a  new  species.  A  new  species  spon- 
taneously appears,  and  if  it  is  the  fittest  to  live,  then  natura" 
selection,  which  is  merely  a  sieve,  determines  that  fact,  so 
that  it  survives,  while  others  less  fit  die.  The  new  variety 
or  species  may  or  may  not  be  a  step  higher  in  development. 
It  may  be  a  step  backward.  No  douht  the  tapeworm,  which 
now  can  live  only  as  a  parasite,  had,  far  enough  back,  a  very 
self-respecting,  hard-working  worm  for  its  grandfather,  who 
made  his  own  living  in  the  open,  without  thinking  of  harbor- 
ing himself  inside  a  man  or  dog  in  order  to  get  his  living 
without  work ;  just  as  many  an  idle  capitalist  of  to-day  is  the 
son  of  a  workingman  of  yesterday. 

To  account  for  the  appearance  of  certain  species  of  animals 
by  any  theory  of  an  imperceptibly  slow  variation  through  the 
workings  of  natural  selection  is  quite  impossible.  For  in- 
stance, take  the  giraffe,  which,  owing  to  its  long  neck,  can 
browse  off  the  branches  of  trees  quite  out  of  reach  of  other 
animals.  Now,  if  the  first  giraffe  had  a  neck  only  a  foot  or 
so  longer  than  this  short-necked  parent,  it  would  not  have 
been  a  bit  better  off  than  with  an  ordinary  neck.  It  was 
three-foot  neck  or  nothing  for  it;  mutate,  or  no  grazing  on 
the  high  trees ! 

The  same  with  the  Australian  ant-eater,  which  has  such  an 
extraordinarily  long  tongue  that  it  can  reach  ants  in  the 
most  secure  ant  hill.  That  tongue  had  to  be  very  long,  to 
say  nothing  of  its  being  very  glutinous,  or  it  would  have 
been  no  improvement  at  all  on  a  short  tongue.    It  is  certainly 


256  Socialism  Inevitable 

much  more  comfortable  to  have  a  mutation  theory  to  explain 
such  jumps  than  to  confess  you  cannot  explain  it  at  all. 

However,  to  get  back  to  the  mutation  theory  as  applied  to 
the  evolution  of  the  organism  of  human  society.  While  no- 
body, probably,  will  ever  be  able  to  explain  why  a  primrose 
mutates,  since  nobody  Can  understand  why  its  cells  prefer  to 
organize  one™ way  more  than  another,  yet  when  we  come 
to  the  question  of  explaining  why  human  society  mutates, 
we  have  a  different  problem.    Society  has  had  revolutions  in 

e  past,  it  has  mutated  from  feudalism  to  capitalism,  and 
Socialists  say  it  must  mutate  from  capitalism  to  Socialism. 
And  the  reason  we  can  speaTE  so  certainly  here  is  that  we 
ourselves  are  the  cells  and  know  why  we  move  from  this  place 
to  that ;  and  why  we  organized  in  the  past  this  form  of  gov- 
ernment in  Russia  and  that  form  of  government  in  America ; 
and  why  we  must  re-organize  our  governments  in  the  future 
upon  new  lines. 

Looking  back,  to-day,  over  the  pages  of  history  we  can  often 
understand  why  men  and  nations  had  to  act  just  as  they  did ; 
yet  we  know  that  at  the  time  the  actions  were  taking  place  the 
people  of  the  day  attributed  the  deeds  largely  to  the  free  will 
of  man.  The  French  Revolution  at  one  time  was,  and,  in  fact, 
even  yet,  is  thought  by  many  good  people  to  have  been  the 
work  of  a  few  bloodthirsty  demons  leading  on  a  bloodthirsty 
mob.  Nowadays  we  have  the  perspective  of  a  century  to  aid 
our  vision,  and  we  can  see  that,  taking  things  as  they  were, 
the  results  were  just  about  as  they  must  have  been. 

To-day  we  have  Miss  Tarbell  painting  Rockefeller  as  the 
arch  enemy  of  society,  a  Danton,  Marat  and  Robespierre 
rolled  into  one,  as  the  man  who  first  brought  iniquity  into 
business,  and  who  is  responsible  for  the  whole  corruption  in 
our  national  life,  and  particularly  as  the  man  who  has  trans- 
formed competition  into  monopoly.  And  what  is  more  to 
the  point,  Miss  Tarbell  undoubtedly  reflects  the  opinion  of 
thousands  of  her  readers.  In  reality,  however,  Rockefeller  is 
merely  the  product  of  our  competitive  system,  and  if  he  had 
not  been  born,  we  would  have  had  some  one  else  who  would 
have  performed  the  same  task  of  consolidating  the  industries 
of  the  country.  In  a  hundred  years  from  to-day  there  will  be 
sufficient  perspective,  and  enough  loss  of  prejudice,  for  even 
the  Miss  Tarbells  to  form  a  proper  estimate  of  Rockefeller, 


The  Mutation  Theory  Applied  to  Society     25? 

who  is  merely  a  cell  in  our  social  organism,  which,  through 
a  fault  in  the  organism  itself,  is  being  over-fed.  The  result  is 
that  at  present  he  has  an  undue  and  disagreeable  prominence 
in  the  national  economy,  just  like  the  over-fed  cell  in  a  man's 
body  which  has  become  a  wart  on  his  nose.  We  don't  blame 
the  wart ;  why  should  we  blame  Eockefeller  ?  We  know  what 
a  wart  is,  and  we  know  how  to  remove  it.  The  Socialists 
know  that  Rockefeller  is  merely  a  wart,  and  that  the  simplest 
way  to  cure  it  is  to  absorb  it.  Let  the  Nation  Absorb  Eocke- 
feller. 

Now  Rockefeller  showed  us  how  to  force  the  competitive 
business  man  to  mutate — jump — from  competition  to  mo- 
nopoly, at  the  very  time  when  all  the  scientists  and  political 
economists  were  gravely  proving  the  impossibility  of  what 
Rockefeller  was  doing  with  such  ease.  But  it  was  no  miracle, 
nor  was  Rockefeller  either  a  god  or  a  devil.  The  conditions 
of  business  had  changed,  and  this  not  only  allowed  him  to 
transform  competition  into  monopoly,  but  actually  forced 
him  to  do  so.  To  Rockefeller  a  change  was  a  matter  of  life 
or  death,  just  as  it  is  when  the  puddle  dries  up,  to  the  tadpole, 
which  must  straightway  develop  lungs  and  breathe  air  as  a 
frog,  or  die  because  his  tadpole  gills  are  no  longer  of  use. 
With  Rockefeller  there  was  no  opportunity  for  half-way  meas- 
ures, no  chance  for  half  competition  or  half  monopoly,  any 
more  than  there  was  with  the  tadpole  partly  to  use  gills  and 
partly  lungs.  It  was  mutate  or  die,  and  mutate  instantly, 
too,  for  both. 

Society  must  jump  from  capitalism  to  Socialism  in  much 
the  same  manner.  The  capitalist  will  persist  in  building  up  the 
industrial  plant  to  the  highest  degree  of  perfection,  he  will 
give  employment  to  all  up  to  the  last,  and  then,  suddenly, 
he  will  find  that  it  will  not  pay  him  to  build  another  factory 
or  another  railway.  There  will  be  a  huge  unemployed  problem, 
and  then  like  a  bolt  from  the  blue,  will  come  the  crash,  leaving 
society  to  mutate  into  Socialism  or  die.  Furthermore,  it  will 
be  a  question  of  "do  it  now."  The  tadpole  had  to  get  very 
busy  changing  into  a  frog,  for  he  could  not  last  very  long 
without  air,  since  it  was  no  lungs,  no  air;  and  man  will  have 
to  get  just  as  busy,  for  he  cannot  last  very  long  without  food, 
and  it  will  be,  no  Socialism,  no  food. 

Now  it  must  not  be  thought  that  an  adherence  to  the  mu- 


258  Socialism  Inevitable 

tation  theory  in  either  biology  or  sociology  excludes  a  belief 
in  progress  by  slow  changes.  Not  at  all :  there  is  progress  by 
slow  stages  and  there  is  also  progress  by  jumps.  Countless 
changes  occur  in  plants  and  animal  life,  some  imperceptibly 
small  and  some  extraordinarily  large.  Those  changes  which 
better  adapt  the  organism  to  live  are  filtered  out  by  the  sieve 
of  Natural  Selection,  and  so  are  perpetuated.  At  the  present 
time  we  simply  know  that  such  changes  occur,  but  why  is  a 
mystery.  Why  they  continue  is  easily  explainable :  they  live 
because  they  are  the  fittest  to  live. 

In  society,  however,  we  can  not  only  explain  why  certain 
changes  persist,  for  natural  selection  quite  accounts  for  it, 
but  we  can  also  explain  why  the  changes  occur,  and  can  even 
positively  predict  their  appearance.  Give  a  people  a  certain 
economic  environment  for  a  sufficient  time,  and  it  is  as  sure 
to  develop  a  certain  political  life,  as  an  apple  tree  is  to  bear 
apples  when  planted  in  the  right  soil  and  climate. 

When  Luther  Burbank  wishes  to  develop  a  new  fruit  he 
plants  thousands  of  seeds,  and  then,  out  of  the  thousands  of 
progeny,  he  may  find  one  plant  that  he  thinks  worth  preserv- 
ing. He  makes  a  bonfire  of  the  rejected.  Now  if  he  does  not 
find  the  plant  he  wishes  he  repeats  the  process  next  season, 
and  so  keeps  it  up  until  at  last  he  gets  just  what  he  wants. 
This  is  artificial  selection,  that  is,  selection  of  the  fittest 
according  to  what  man  thinks  best  rather  than  selection  by 
nature  of  what  can  best  survive  in  competition  with  other 
plants.. 

Burbank  now  promises  us  a  thornless,  edible  cactus  which 
will  allow  a  man  to  use  the  deserts  for  his  food  supply.  Such 
a  plant,  of  course,  could  have  been  developed  only  by  artificial 
selection,  for  a  thornless  cactus  in  the  desert  with  hungry, 
grazing  animals  all  about  would  hardly  be  able  to  demonstrate 
its  fitness  to  survive.  For  the  very  reason  that  a  cactus  with- 
out thorns  is  the  fittest  to  eat,  gives  it,  in  Nature's  opinion, 
the  least  chance  of  living  and  propagating  its  kind. 

In  to-day's  competitive  strife  the  man  who  is  the  fittest  to 
live  is  not  the  soundest,  sweetest  and  most  beautiful  fruit  on 
the  tree  of  humanity,  but  the  one  with  the  most  thorns,  the 
thickest  skin  and  hardest  heart.  Nevertheless,  just  as  Burbank 
has  shown  us  that  the  most  thorny  cactus  may  develop  into 
the  least  thorny  one  when  the  necessity  for  thorns  has  passed 


The  Mutation  Theory  Applied  to  Society     259 

away,  so  we  may  look  for  man  also  to  drop  his  thorns,  when 
the  competition  which  makes  them  necessary  has  forever 
disappeared.  In  fact,  Burbank  himself  has  recently  said  that 
just  as  wonderful  changes  might  be  made  in  man  as  he  is 
making  in  flowers,  if  only  the  children  were  as  carefully  reared 
and  protected  as  are  the  plants  in  his  California  nursery. 

How  wretchedly  we  are  caring  for  our  children  to-day  may 
be  judged  by  the  following  from  a  recent  issue  of  the  New 
York  Sun: 

The  health  authorities  under  the  direction  of  Dr.  Herman 
Biggs  have  just  completed  a  very  important  investigation  into 
the  health  of  some  of  the  school  children  of  this  city,  which  has 
shown  a  prevalence  of  disease  exceeding  their  expectations. 

The  figures  compiled  by  the  medical  inspectors  and  now  in 
Dr.  Bigg's  possession  show  that  out  of  almost  14,000  children 
examined  more  than  6,000,  or  almost  half,  had  something  the 
matter  with  them. 

"While  the  health  authorities  have  been  gradually  extending 
their  work  of  looking  after  the  health  of  school  children,  they 
have  never  gone  so  far  as  to  make  the  general  physical  condi- 
tion of  a  child  part  of  the  work  of  the  Health  Department.  Until 
recent  years  all  that  the  medical  inspectors  in  the  schools  did 
was  to  examine  all  cases  reported  by  the  teacher  as  being  possi- 
bly infectious.  This  work  in  itself  requires  a  lot  of  inspectors. 
Later,  skin  diseases  and  pediculosis,  which  was  especially 
prevalent,  were  included. 

This  ought  to  demonstrate  pretty  thoroughly  that  our 
children  should  not  fear  a  mutation  into  a  different  life  from 
the  present. 

The  mutation  theory  of  evolution  in  biology  seems  un- 
doubtedly the  true  one,  for  by  it  all  the  lapses  hitherto  inex- 
plicable in  the  slow  progress,  "step-by-step"  theory  of  Darwin 
are  explained.  Mutation  does  not  overthrow  Darwinism:  it 
merely  puts  it  on  a  firmer  foundation,  while  it  strengthens 
and  simplifies  the  analogy  between  social  and  biological 
changes. 

When  the  mutation  theory  is  at  last  accepted,  therefore,  it 
will  remove  one  of  the  strongest  objections  made  by  certain 
evolutionists  who  have  been  insisting  that  such  a  tremendous 
change  as  that  from  capitalism  to  Socialism  could  be  accom- 
plished only  through  the  lapse  of  innumerable  centuries. 
Eight  now,  while  this  nation  is  in  the  heyday  of  industrial 
prosperity,  with  prices  never  so  high,  crops  never  so  good, 


260  Socialism  Inevitable 

labor  never  in  such  demand,  the  day  when  all  will  be  changed 
seems  to  me  almost  at  hand,  the  day  when  prices  will  be  at  the 
lowest  ebb,  yet  without  benefit  to  labor,  which  will  then  be 
unemployed  and  consequently  without  money. 

Let  peace  be  made  between  Japan  and  Russia,  let  no  new 
war  break  out,  and  no  inventions  revolutionize  our  methods 
of  production,  and  the  time  when  production  will  far  exceed 
demand  seems  to  me  to  be  almost  within  the  year.  Let  a 
huge  unemployed  army  arise  in  the  United  States,  let  thou- 
sands upon  thousands  of  our  smaller  capitalists  and  farmers 
become  bankrupt;  then  the  lessons  that  the  Tarbells,  the 
Steffens,  the  Eussells,  the  Sinclairs,  the  Moffets  and  the  Law- 
sons  are  to-day  teaching  the  public  will  bring  their  logical 
result. 

The  mind  of  the  nation  is  being  prepared,  in  an  almost 
miraculous  way,  to  receive  the  theories  of  the  Socialist  when 
the  next  industrial  crisis  appears — and  at  this  very  hour  I  can 
hear  its  approaching  rumble. 

Let  the  capitalist  look  well  upon  his  present  sun  of  pros- 
perity, for  when  it  next  sinks  it  may  sink  forever,  and 
Socialism  rise  to  light  the  world  for  all. 


An  Easy  Way  to  Wealth:  Wish  Foe  It       261 


AN  EASY  WAY  TO  WEALTH,  WISH  FOR  IT 

(December,  1903.) 

VERY  few  people,  whether  rich  or  poor,  are  satisfied  in 
this  world,  although  most  of  the  poor  think  that  if  they 
were  only  rich  they  would  have  no  trouble  in  finding 
the  joy  of  life. 

Now,  inasmuch  as  one  per  cent,  of  the  population  of  the 
United  States  own  more  property  than  the  whole  of  the  remain- 
ing ninety-nine  per  cent.,  it  is  a  hundred  to  one  shot  that  the 
person  who  is  reading  this  article  belongs  to  the  ninety-nine 
class,  and  to  him  I  address  myself.  You  are  dissatisfied, — or 
if  you  are  not  you  ought  to  be, — because  you  are  not  rich ;  so 
I  am  going  to  show  you  why  you  are  poor,  and  how  you  may 
get  rich  easily.  This  is  not  any  program  such  as  is  usually 
presented,  of  saving  your  money  and  investing  it  in  a  deferred 
dividend  policy  in  Papa  McCurdy's  New  York  Mutual  Life 
Insurance  Company. 

You  probably  are  getting  either  wages  or  a  salary  of  some 
sort.  I  say  this  because  most  of  the  people  who  are  poor 
belong  to  the  wage-earning  class.  You  are,  of  course,  a  reader 
of  the  newspapers,  and  love  to  hear  about  the  enormous  ma- 
terial prosperity  of  this  country.  For  instance,  I  quote  the 
following  from  the  morning  Tribune  of  October  5th : 

AN  ERA  OF  PROSPERITY. 

There  are  signs  on  every  hand  these  days  of  overflowing  na- 
tional prosperity.  The  United  States  is  to  harvest  this  year  the 
biggest  corn  crop  it  has  ever  grown  and  the  biggest  wheat  crop 
in  its  history,  with  one  exception.  Our  exports  and  imports  will 
break  all  records.  Immigration  is  reaching  a  new  high-water 
mark.  Our  iron  and  steel  output  will  be  the  largest  ever  known, 
and  we  shall  touch  a  new  high  level  in  coal  production.  It  was 
announced  the  other  day  that  postal  receipts  for  1904-'05  had 
exceeded  those  for  1903-'04  by  $10,000,000.  The  Post  Office  De- 
partment's money-order  business  showed  a  gain  for  the  year  of 
20  per  cent. — an  unerring  evidence  of  widely  diffused  prosperity. 
Now  come  Dun's  and  Bradstreet's  reports  on  commercial  failures 


262  Socialism  Inevitable 

in  the  United  States  for  the  first  nine  months  of  1905  to  testify 
to  steadily  improving  trade  conditions. 

There  is  no  disputing  these  statements.  The  nation  un- 
doubtedly is  getting  richer ;  but  the  question  is  not  about  the 
nation,  but  about  you,  little  you — are  you  getting  richer  ?  The 
statistics  issued  by  the  United  States  Commissioner  of  Labor 
show  that,  during  the  last  year,  wages  have  been  practically  at 
a  standstill,  although  the  cost  of  living  has  materially  ad- 
vanced. Hence,  if  you  are  the  average  man  of  the  wage- 
earning  class,  you  are  not  so  well  off  as  you  were  a  year  ago, 
notwithstanding  the  increasing  prosperity  of  the  country. 

Now  no  one  takes  less  wages  than  he  can  get,  or  pays  more 
for  his  beefsteak  and  his  potatoes  than  he  must.  The  condition 
which  forces  you  to  take  a  low  wage  is  that  you  know  the 
job  will  be  filled  by  some  other  man  unless  you  accept  what  is 
offered,  and  the  condition  which  makes  you  pay  more  for  your 
food  is  that  you  must  either  do  so  or  go  hungry. 

Now,  what  I  am  trying  to  get  at  is  that  you  have  no  choice 
in  the  matter.  You  have  to  accept  conditions  as  they  are; 
and  what  applies  to  you  applies  to  all  members  of  the  working 
class.  The  reason  wages  are  low  is  merely  that  there  are  plenty 
of  men  who  are  willing  to  accept  low  wages;  and  if  one 
refuses  to  take  what  is  offered,  he  quickly  finds  his  place  filled 
by  another.  It  is  competition  against  the  unemployed  that 
reduces  wages,  and  unless  you  can  remedy  this,  there  is  ob- 
viously no  way  of  your  becoming  better  off,  no  matter  how 
prosperous  the  country  may  be. 

The  problem,  in  other  words,  is  to  get  rid  of  the  unem- 
ployed ;  and  by  that  you  do  not  mean  men  of  the  leisure  class, 
such  as  Mr.  Vanderbilt's  son,  who  does  not  work  because  he 
has  an  independent  income.  He  may  be  quite  "unemployed," 
and  yet  you  do  not  feel  any  competition  from  him :  the  un- 
employed man  you  fear  is  the  one  who  has  no  income  unless 
he  is  at  work.  There  can  be  no  doubt  that  if  a  man  is  hungry 
and  wishes  food,  he  will  not  stay  long  in  such  a  condition  if 
he  can  work  and  earn  something  to  feed  himself.  A  savage 
in  the  woods  will  catch  a  fish  or  shoot  a  deer,  and  thus  satisfy 
his  hunger.  But  the  modern  civilized  man  cannot  do  this :  he 
must  get  food  the  way  everyone  else  does,  that  is,  by  earning 
money;  and  the  only  way  he  has  of  getting  money  is  to  sell 


An  Easy  Way  to  Wealth:  Wish  For  It        263 

his  labor  to  someone  who  will  buy  it,  and  with  the  wages 
which  are  paid  him  to  purchase  the  food  he  requires. 

But  it  often  happens  that  it  is  not  so  easy  to  find  a  man 
who  wishes  to  hire  him.  Some  political  economists  have  en- 
deavored to  prove  that  somewhere  in  the  world  there  is  always 
an  employer  ready  to  hire  labor  if  one  only  knew  where  to  find 
him.  They  make  it  appear  that  the  reason  there  is  difficulty 
in  getting  employment  is  solely  on  account  of  lack  of  knowl- 
edge of  where  labor  is  in  demand.  This,  however,  is  quite  a 
mistake.  The  employer  can  give  employment  only  when  he 
can  sell  what  is  produced;  and  as  the  working  class  are  the 
principal  consumers,  since  they  constitute  the  greater  part  of 
the  community,  and  as  their  powers  of  buying  are  restricted 
by  the  competitive  wage  system,  it  is  not  difficult  to  see  that 
the  employer  himself  has  not  an  unlimited  market  for  his 
goods,  and,  therefore,  cannot  furnish  unlimited  employment. 

Now  the  earth  is  so  very  productive  when  man's  labor  is 
applied  to  it  with  modern  machinery  that  it  is  very  easy  to 
produce  more  to  eat  and  to  wear,  that  is,  more  of  the  plain 
necessities,  than  man  needs  or  wants,  and  especially  is  it  easy 
to  produce  more  than  he  can  buy,  when  we  remember  that 
his  buying  capacity  is  so  limited  by  the  Competitive  Wage 
System.  For  it  is  clear  that  the  employers  are  not  in  control 
of  the  situation,  but  can  hire  men  only  under  certain  con- 
ditions, viz.,  that  they  can  sell  what  is  produced.  Therefore, 
it  is  seen  that  the  Competitive  System  not  only  prevents 
you  from  getting  a  decent  wage  when  you  are  employed,  but 
it  often  makes  it  difficult  for  you  to  get  any  wages  at  all,  owing 
to  the  fact  that  the  employer  cannot  sell  what  is  produced, 
and,  therefore,  cannot  hire  you  to  work. 

It  is  certainly  evident  that  if  you  wish  to  abolish  poverty, 
the  first  thing  to  do  is  to  consider  a  method  of  abolishing 
the  Competitive  System;  but  as  this  at  least  provides  a 
system  of  distribution — although  a  very  poor  one — you  must 
be  ready  to  substitute  some  other  system  to  do  the  distributing. 
The  Socialists  propose  that  we  substitute  the  Co-operative 
System,  which  means  that,  instead  of  paying  men  upon  the 
basis  of  how  little  their  labor  can  be  bought  for,  they  be  paid 
upon  the  basis  of  what  they  actually  produce.  To-day,  as  I 
have  already  pointed  out,  the  more  a  man  produces,  the  more 
difficult  it  may  be  for  him  to  get  any  wages  at  all,  because 


264:  Socialism  Inevitable 

the  market  becomes  flooded  with  goods,  perhaps  the  very  goods 
that  he  himself  has  produced;  and,  therefore,  he  cannot  sell 
his  labor,  owing  to  there  being  no  demand  for  it.  Under  the 
Co-operative  System,  the  more  he  produces,  the  more  he  gets, 
because  goods  will  be  produced  for  consumption  and  not  for 
profit. 

To-day  if  you  are  working  in  a  shoe  factory  and  there  is  an 
overproduction  of  shoes,  it  does  not  mean  that  you  get  more 
shoes  than  you  know  what  to  do  with.  It  simply  means  that 
you  lose  your  job.  It  means  that  there  are  more  shoes  pro- 
duced than  can  be  sold,  and  therefore,  that  you  do  not  get 
any  shoes  at  all,  for,  naturally,  you  do  not  get  money  to  buy 
shoes  when  you  are  out  of  work.  If  we  had  Socialism  and 
there  was  overproduction  of  goods,  the  hours  of  labor  would 
be  reduced  to  make  consumption  equal  demand. 

One  essential  point,  however,  in  connection  with  the  Co- 
operative System  which  I  have  omitted  to  state,  and  which  is 
necessary  to  the  success  of  its  operations,  is  the  Public  Owner- 
ship of  the  means  of  production.  You  have  heard  a  great 
deal  recently  of  Public  Ownership,  and  no  doubt  it  has  puzzled 
many  people  to  understand  how  it  is  to  be  of  any  benefit  to 
the  working  man,  and  especially  to  the  unemployed  man. 
One  reason  of  this  lack  of  ability  to  understand  the  advantage 
of  Public  Ownership  is  that  it  usually  is  not  clearly  explained. 
We  to-day  have  Public  Ownership  of  the  postoffice,  and  yet 
that  does  not  mean  that  a  man  can  get  employment  at  good 
wages  merely  because  he  is  out  of  a  job  and  the  postoffice 
belongs  to  the  Government.  But  if  we  had  the  Co-operative 
System  joined  with  Public  Ownership,  it  would  mean  that 
any  one  wanting  food  or  clothing,  or  any  other  form  of 
wealth,  would  be  at  liberty  to  demand  work  from  the  nation, 
and  would  be  sure  not  only  of  getting  work,  but  also  of  re- 
ceiving the  full  value  of  his  services.  He  would  be  sure  of 
this  because  it  would  be  simply  utilizing  for  his  own  benefit 
the  machinery  of  production,  of  which  he  himself,  would  be 
one  of  the  joint  owners.  He  might  be  compared  to  the  savage 
who  went  out  with  his  bow  and  arrow  and  shot  the  deer  for 
his  dinner.  The  bow  and  arrow  were  his  "means  of  produc- 
tion," and  the  earth  upon  which  the  deer  fed  was  also  his 
own,  in  that  it  was  free  to  all.  However,  although  the  savage 
had  a  complete  ownership  of  his  means  of  production,  he 


An  Easy  Way  to  Wealth:  Wish  For  It        265 

could  gain  only  a  meagre  living  by  the  most  strenuous  work, 
because  a  bow  and  arrow  are  very  poor  tools  of  production 
compared  with  our  modern  machinery. 

To-day  the  workingman,  by  his  knowledge  of  labor-saving 
machinery,  can  produce  a  hundred  times  as  much  as  the 
savage  with  his  bow  and  arrow;  but  the  trouble  is  that  co- 
incident with  this  largely  increased  production  he  has  lost 
the  ownership  of  the  means  of  production.  That  is,  he  can- 
not use  machinery  without  first  getting  the  permission  of  a 
capitalist  owner,  which  means  being  hired  by  the  capitalists 
whenever  they  find  that  they  can  buy  his  labor  and  sell  the 
product  at  a  profit.  But  even  though  a  railroad  or  a  shoe 
factory  were  given  to  the  individual  workingman,  absolutely 
free  of  cost,  he  would  find  it  useless  to  him  if  he  had  to  work 
it  independently,  inasmuch  as  the  machinery  of  to-day  re- 
quires collective  management  upon  a  large  scale. 

Hence  if  the  workingman  wishes  to  be  able  to  use  the 
modern  tools  of  production,  it  is  evident  not  only  that  must 
he  own  them,  but  also  that  he  must  organize  with  other  work- 
ingmen  upon  a  larger  scale  in  order  to  be  able  to  use  them. 
Capitalism,  in  short,  has  developed  not  only  the  tools  but  the 
organization  of  workingmen  to  operate  the  tools;  but  unfor- 
tunately it  has  not  developed  an  equitable  system  for  the  dis- 
tribution of  what  is  produced.  The  only  way  by  which  the 
product  can  be  equitably  distributed,  as  has  heretofore  been 
stated,  is  by  the  Co-operative  System. 

To  go  back  to  the  illustration  of  the  savage.  Suppose 
there  were  two  savages,  and  that  the  bow  was  so  large  that  it 
required  both  men  to  bend  it,  but  that  the  ownership  of  the 
bow  was  vested  in  one  of  the  men.  It  is  obvious  that  the  other 
man  would  not  only  have  to  get  the  permission  of  the  owner 
of  the  bow  before  he  could  use  it,  but  he  would  also  have  to 
get  his  help  to  bend  it.  Therefore,  if  he  wished  to  be  on  the 
safe  side  regarding  his  supply  of  food,  he  would  form  a  com- 
bination with  the  other  savage  so  that  they  would  own  the 
bow  in  partnership,  and  would  agree  to  work  it  jointly  and  co- 
operatively and  so  divide  whatever  game  they  might  kill. 

Similarly,  in  order  for  the  workingman  to  be  sure  of  getting 
his  food  and  clothing  and  the  other  goods  that  he  wishes,  he 
must  own  the  machinery  of  production,  and  must  organize 
to  operate  the  machinery  on  the  co-operative  plan.    Now  the 


266  Socialism  Inevitable 

only  feasible  way  for  such  machinery  as  railroads  and  other 
great  modern  tools  of  production  to  be  owned  publicly  is 
through  the  medium  of  Government  Ownership,  which  is  by 
no  means  such  a  difficult  proposition  to  work  out  practically 
as  it  might  seem  to  one  who  takes  up  the  idea  for  the  first 
time. 

Public  Ownership  of  the  means  of  production,  indeed,  is 
already  in  practical  operation  in  a  limited  way  in  this  coun- 
try, as  well  as  in  foreign  countries.  We  have  the  government 
ownership  of  the  postoffice,  and  the  municipal  ownership  of 
gas,  water  works,  and  a  few  other  such  utilities.  In  Europe 
many  cities  own  and  operate  their  own  street  cars  and  tele- 
phone lines;  others  conduct  public  bakeries,  and,  in  fact, 
there  is  hardly  any  single  operation  which  is  not  carried  on 
in  one  way  or  another  in  some  part  of  the  world  by  a  municipal 
or  national  government. 

It  is  certainly  easy  to  show  that  there  is  no  machinery 
which  cannot  be  operated  by  the  government:  the  difficulty 
is  to  convince  the  people  of  the  advantage  to  be  derived  from 
Government  Ownership  in  itself.  For  instance,  the  English 
Government  owns  the  telegraph  system,  whereas  in  this  coun- 
try it  is  in  private  hands,  and  yet  it  would  be  hard  to  show 
that  for  this  reason  poverty  is  any  less  prevalent  there  than 
here.  The  point  that  is  continually  being  missed  is  that  it 
is  not  merely  Government  Ownership  in  itself  that  is  to  solve 
the  problem  of  poverty,  it  is  the  Co-operative  System  that  is 
to  do  it,  and  Public  Ownership  is  the  necessary  basis  for  the 
Co-operative  System.  In  other  words,  Public  Ownership  is 
distinctly  a  means  and  not  an  end. 

I  promised  in  the  beginning  of  this  article  to  show  you 
how  to  get  rich  without  any  great  exertion,  and  it  seems  to  me 
that  if  you  have  followed  my  argument  you  will  see  that  I 
have  fulfilled  my  promise.  Labor  and  capital  in  this  country 
can  obviously  produce  much  more  food  and  clothing  and  other 
necessities  of  life  than  the  public  can  ever  consume.  I  say 
obviously,  because,  a  hundred  years  ago,  before  we  had  much 
of  any  machinery,  everyone  in  the  country  had  a  fair  living, 
and  as  with  the  use  of  present  machinery  labor  is  at  least 
twenty  times  as  effective  as  it  was  formerly,  it  may  safely  be 
said  that  it  will  require  only  one-twentieth  the  work  per 
capita  to  produce  the  same  quantity  of  goods. 


An  Easy  Way  to  Wealth:  Wish  For  It        267 

The  wealth  of  the  country  is  here  at  the  disposal  of  the 
voters,  and  as  the  working  class  constitutes  the  vast  majority 
of  the  voters,  it  is  merely  a  question  of  them  realizing  how 
to  vote  in  order  to  inaugurate  the  Socialist  System.  Let 
them  support  the  only  party  which  demands  the  Public  Owner- 
ship of  the  means  of  production  and  the  Co-operative  System 
of  distribution,  viz.,  the  Socialist  Party. 

To  sum  up.  As  long  as  we  have  our  Competitive  System, 
we  must  necessarily  have  the  unemployed  man.  To  get  rid  of 
the  unemployed  man  we  must  place  the  ownership  of  the  tools 
of  production  of  the  country  in  his  hands  and  let  him  produce 
for  himself  what  he  wishes.  With  modern  machinery  this 
can  be  done  only  through  the  collective  action  of  the  people, 
viz.:  Public  Ownership  and  the  establishment  of  the  Co- 
operative Commonwealth. 

It  seems  to  me  that  I  have  given  a  very  straight  statement  of 
how  we  may  abolish  poverty,  and  at  the  same  time  acquire 
wealth  with  practically  no  exertion.  We  simply  have  to  wish 
for  the  earth  in  order  to  get  it,  and  there  is  but  one  way  to 
wish  effectively  for  it ;  that  is  to  vote  for  the  Socialist  Party. 

Let  the  nation  own  the  resources  of  the  earth,  the  land, 
the  machinery,  the  water  power,  the  coal  mines ;  let  us  make 
these  natural  powers  work  for  us  and  produce  the  wealth  that 
we  all  wish,  and  let  us  distribute  that  wealth  co-operatively 
to  ourselves. 


268  Socialism  Inevitable 


MUNICIPAL  OWNERSHIP— ITS  MEANING 

(January,   1906.) 

MUNICIPAL  OWNERSHIP  is  admittedly  the  political 
question  of  the  hour,  but  what  our  politicians  are 
now  bothering  their  heads  about  is  whether  it  is 
destined  to  be  the  question  of  the  future,  or  like  the  silver 
issue,  to  burn  fiercely  for  a  while  and  then  die  without  leaving 
a  flicker  to  remind  us  of  its  existence. 

For  years  prior  to  1896  the  politicians  of  both  parties  were 
flirting  with  free  silver.  The  merits  of  the  question,  of  course, 
did  not  concern  them:  it  was  simply  that  free  silver  was 
becoming  popular,  and  as  it  seemed  so  remotely  connected 
with  any  possibility  of  realization,  those  against  silver  did  not 
take  the  matter  seriously  enough  to  deny  their  votes  to  its 
advocates. 

Advocating  free  silver  was  all  to  the  good  for  the  politician 
until,  at  last,  the  nomination  of  Bryan  upon  the  silver  plat- 
form adopted  by  the  Democratic  Party  suddenly  made  it  a 
living  issue.  The  politicians  were  then  forced  to  reverse  their 
positions,  for  a  man  could  no  longer  fervidly  declare  himself 
for  free  silver  and  take  the  chance  that  the  sincerity  of  his 
sentiments  would  never  be  put  to  the  test.  It  became  evident, 
in  fact,  that  unless  the  most  strenuous  work  were  done  the 
Democrats  would  win  and  the  country  go  upon  a  silver  basis. 
However,  the  strenuous  work  was  done,  as  we  all  know,  most 
of  the  politicians  eating  their  words  wherein  they  had  de- 
clared fealty  to  silver,  and  becoming  earnest  advocates  of 
"honest  money."  It  may  be  remembered,  indeed,  that  Presi- 
dent McKinley  himself,  not  so  many  years  before,  had  cast 
his  vote  in  Congress  for  free  silver.  But  the  campaign  was 
carried  on,  not  upon  what  men  had  advocated  before  1896, 
but  upon  what  they  advocated  that  memorable  year. 

Now,  municipal  ownership,  as  a  political  policy,  has  a 
number  of  features  not  altogether  different  from  free  silver. 
Until  recently  it  has  been  an  issue  so  remote  that  the  politi- 


Municipal  Ownership — Its  Meaning  269 

cians  felt  no  fear  in  advocating  it,  but  like  the  free  silver 
question,  which  was  once  looked  upon  as  merely  the  dreaming 
of  faddists,  it  has  all  at  once  become  the  active  political  issue 
of  the  day.  Unlike  free  silver,  however,  it  has  such  a  strong 
economic  basis,  that  the  hostility  of  the  larger  capitalists 
cannot  defeat  it  by  a  mere  array  of  statistics  and  appeals  to 
sound  common  sense  such  as  were  found  so  effective  in  the 
Bryan  campaign  in  1896. 

Now  that  the  silver  fever  is  dead  and  passed  away,  most 
of  its  advocates  will  usually  admit  that  it  was  really  an 
economic  heresy,  and  that  the  country  was  fortunate  in  having 
a  Mark  Hanna  at  hand  with  his  generalship  and  his  immense 
contributions  from  the  trusts  to  demonstrate  the  errors  of 
sixteen  to  one  and  the  necessity  of  defeating  Bryan. 

It  is  noteworthy,  moreover,  that  most  of  the  old  free  silver 
shouters  are  now  in  line  for  municipal  ownership  and  the 
explanation  of  the  connection  between  the  two  is  found  in  the 
fact  that  there  is  a  tendency  for  a  political  party  to  form  in 
this  country  as  representatives  of  the  moderately  well-to-do- 
people  as  against  the  very  rich. 

The  free  coinage  of  silver  was  an  attempt  of  the  poorer 
classes  to  raise  themselves  towards  economic  equality  with 
the  rich,  and  the  only  reason  it  has  been  abandoned  is  that  it 
was  recognized  to  be  a  futile  method,  an  attempt  to  raise 
oneself  by  one's  bootstraps.  It  was  not  an  impossible  task  to 
show  the  American  voter  that  as  long  as  Mr.  Bockef  eller  owned 
the  oil  refineries,  and  Mr.  Vanderbilt  the  railways,  and  Mr. 
Belmont  the  street  cars,  and  as  long  as  the  American  voter 
himself  owned  practically  nothing,  no  matter  whether  his 
wages  were  paid  in  silver  or  in  gold,  he  was  sure  to  be  rapidly 
separated  from  his  money  whenever  he  bought  oil  or  rode  on 
a  railway  or  a  street  car. 

Before  1896  there  were  many  men  who  had  a  kind  of  hazy 
idea  that  some  sort  of  juggling  with  the  medium  of  exchange 
would  institute  a  millennium,  wherein  vthe  common  people 
would  have  all  the  comforts  of  life  and  some  of  the  luxuries, 
while  at  the  same  time  the  rich  would  have  even  more  than  to- 
day. The  Republican  Party  and  Mr.  Hanna  forever  dissipated 
all  such  crude  ideas.  Most  of  the  people  now  see  that  there  is 
but  one  earth,  and  that  if  Rockefeller  owns  it,  the  other  fellow 
cannot  own  it,  any  more  than  one  can  eat  his  cake  and  have 


270  Socialism  Inevitable 

it  too.  However,  while  there  is  a  pretty  fair  knowledge  of  this 
very  elementary  proposition,  the  possibility  of  getting  the  earth 
away  from  Mr.  Kockefeller  by  commercial  means  appears  so 
remote,  and  to  take  it  from  him  by  any  political  method  seems 
so  dangerous  that  the  people  are  almost  in  despair.  Rockefeller 
certainly  does  not  spend  the  half,  or  even  a  tenth  of  his  in- 
come ;  in  fact  he  cannot  spend  twenty  million  a  year,  so  that 
as  long  as  he  is  "saving"  up  so  many  millions,  there  is  no 
hope  of  us  getting  or  his  losing  his  wealth.  The  old  theory 
of  the  decentralization  of  wealth  by  waste  and  extravagance 
does  not  apply  to  such  fortunes  as  Rockefeller's. 

As  for  his  losing  it  by  foolish  investments,  that,  too,  is 
impossible.  First,  because  with  his  income  of  twenty  millions 
a  year  he  can  afford  to  lose  what  might  be  regarded  as  vast 
fortunes  and  still  have  millions  left  to  add  to  his  capital. 
Secondly,  because  the  investment  of  his  surplus  is  in  the 
hands  of  his  own  staff  of  experts,  who  go  about  the  matter 
so  mathematically  and  scientifically — running  no  chances  and 
taking  nothing  for  granted — that  where  a  poorer  man  will 
find  it  cheaper  to  forego  investigation  and  chance  a  loss,  with 
Rockefeller,  such  is  the  magnitude  of  his  interests,  that  he 
can  always  afford  a  careful  investigation  of  every  proposed 
investment.  And  what  is  true  of  Rockefeller  applies  in  only 
a  slightly  minor  degree  to  many  others  of  our  larger  capital- 
ists. Then,  again,  many  of  the  smaller  capitalists  invest 
their  savings  co-operatively,  so  to  speak,  in  a  trust  company, 
which,  making  large  investments,  can  afford  to  apply  the 
Rockefeller  methods,  thus  giving  them  something  of  the 
safety  enjoyed  by  Mr.  Rockefeller.  Hence  it  is  evident  that 
by  no  commercial  methods  now  prevailing  will  the  people 
ever  see  Rockefeller  &  Co.  lose  their  grip  on  the  wealth  of  the 
country. 

Now  when  a  political  method  to  effect  a  fairer  distribution 
of  wealth  is  suggested  without  any  specific  details,  the  ordinary 
citizen  has  a  horrid  vision  of  the  country  falling  into  the 
hands  of  a  mob,  and  a  holiday  set  when  all  the  property  of 
the  rich  will  be  divided  up  among  the  poor.  He  not  only 
knows  that  any  such  division  would  be  futile,  inasmuch  as  it 
would  not  be  many  years  before  Rockefeller  or  somebody  worse 
would  have  acquired  all  the  money  again,  but  he  also  objects 
to  throwing  his  own  wealth  into  the  pile  with  no  certainty  of 


Municipal  Ownership — Its  Meaning  271 

getting  back  in  the  grand  division  as  much  as  he  now  possesses. 

Thus,  while  there  is  certainly  a  general  desire  for  a  better 
distribution  of  wealth,  the  means  of  obtaining  it  seem  so 
impossible  that  the  desire  has  not  as  yet  come  into  the  realm 
of  practical  politics.  Free  silver,  as  said  before,  had  its  run 
of  popularity  because  of  this  underlying  feeling  of  the  people 
that  something  should  be  done  to  establish  more  of  an  economic 
equality. 

Now,  while  it  can  be  easily  shown  that  municipal  ownership 
is  unquestionably  a  very  important  step  toward  an  equaliza- 
tion of  economic  opportunity,  it  is  doubtful  if  its  popularity 
as  a  movement  can  be  rightly  ascribed  to  any  definite  knowl- 
edge on  the  part  of  its  advocates.  In  fact,  a  great  many  of 
them — such  as  Judge  Dunne,  of  Chicago,  and  Mayor  Johnson, 
of  Cleveland,  would  no  doubt  attempt  to  deny  it,  or,  admitting 
it,  would  minimize  it.  But  that  such  is  really  the  truth  re- 
garding municipal  ownership  can  be  seen  by  a  moment's 
reflection. 

When  we  speak  of  a  great  capitalist  like  Kockef eller  owning 
the  earth,  what  do  we  really  mean?  We  mean  he  owns  some 
land,  some  railways,  some  oil  refineries,  some  street-car  lines, 
etc.,  or,  rather,  we  mean  that  he  has  large  amounts  of  stock 
in  certain  corporations  which  own  such  properties.  Now  if 
the  city  of  Chicago  buys  the  street-car  lines  from  Mr.  Eocke- 
feller,  it  certainly  is  self-evident  that  each  and  every  citizen 
of  Chicago  has  acquired  by  that  operation  a  share  with  his 
fellow  citizens  in  the  ownership  and  management  of  a  prop- 
erty where  formerly  he  had  neither  ownership  nor  direction. 
There  will  have  unquestionably  been  a  transfer  of  wealth  and 
power  from  Eockefeller  to  himself,  and,  although  the  citizen 
may  hardly  realize  the  import  of  the  transaction,  there  is  little 
doubt  but  that  Mr.  Eockefeller  understands  it,  and  very 
thoroughly,  too.  There  has  been  no  confiscation  of  the  street- 
car line,  for  Mr.  Eockefeller  will  have  been  paid  full  value  in 
money  or  bonds  for  his  property. 

It  might  be  noted,  on  the  other  hand,  that  the  changing 
of  the  coinage  from  gold  to  silver  would  have  accomplished 
no  such  transfer  of  property,  and  as  it  is  this  latent  desire  of 
the  people  to  socialize  the  ownership  of  property,  that  in  my 
estimation,  is  forming  the  basic  impulse  of  the  movement  for 
public  ownership,  I  therefore  see  for  it  a  great  success  where 


272  Socialism  Inevitable 

the  free  silver  movement  met  with  dismal  failure.  However* 
while  this  vague  desire  of  the  people  for  economic  equality  is 
the  power  behind  the  municipal  ownership  movement,  still 
I  would  be  the  last  to  deny  that  there  are  certain  superficial 
conditions  connected  with  the  private  ownership  of  public 
utilities  which  have  given  the  movement  its  present  impor- 
tance. 

In  the  first  place,  the  bad  service  rendered  by  private  cor- 
porations has  greatly  stimulated  the  desire  for  a  change. 
When  Yerkes  said,  "The  dividends  are  in  the  straps,"  he  gave 
us  the  whole  theory  of  private  ownership  of  street-car  lines. 
The  private  corporation  was  not  formed  to  serve  the  public, 
but  to  make  dividends  for  its  stockholders.  If  one  car  can  be 
used  to  carry  a  double  load  by  the  simple  expedient  of  making 
half  of  the  occupants  stand  up  and  hang  on  to  straps,  then 
why  should  money  be  wasted  in  buying  more  cars  and  paying 
wages  to  two  conductors  and  two  motormen  instead  of  to  one  ? 
If  people  must  have  water,  pure  or  impure,  then  why  waste 
money  upon  a  filtration  plant,  which  may  save  lives  from 
typhoid,  but  will  never  increase  the  profits  of  companies  own- 
ing the  water  works  ? 

Every  organism  must  obey  the  fundamental  law  of  its 
existence.  The  fundamental  law  of  a  private  corporation  is  to 
develop  profits,  while  the  fundamental  law  of  a  public  corj- 
poration  is  to  develop  life.  When  the  water  works  are  privately 
owned,  profits  come  first,  and  when  the  works  are  publicly 
owned,  pure  water  and  good  health  come  first.  And  this  law 
of  private  corporations  holds  good  even  when  the  stockholders 
are  of  the  highest  respectability. 

For  instance,  take  the  following  case  of  private  ownership 
of  water  in  Ithaca,  N.  Y.,  given  by  Samuel  Hopkins  Adams, 
in  a  recent  number  of  McClure's  Magazine: 

For  two  years,  in  Ithaca,  in  1903,  the  water  had  been  so  obvious- 
ly unfit  to  drink  that  the  water  company,  a  private  enterprise, 
was  constantly  in  receipt  of  complaints  from  the  local  board  of 
health  and  from  private  citizens.  Its  contract  called  for  water 
free  from  disease-producing  organisms;  the  State  has  acquired 
reasonable  guardianship  of  its  water-shed.  Contract  and  law 
seem  to  have  been  matters  of  equal  indifference  to  the  corpor- 
ation. As  subsequent  testimony  showed — after  the  tragedy  was 
over — the  water-shed  which  supplied  the  city  was  lined  with 
pig-styes,  manure  piles,  garbage  heaps,  cattle  pens  and  outhouses, 


Municipal  Ownership — Its  Meaning  273 

many  of  them  discharging  their  contents,  with  only  a  few  yards' 
flow,  direct  into  Six-Mile  Creek,  or  the  streams  that  supplied  it. 
Whosoever  reads  the  evidence  adduced  at  the  investigation  needs 
to  have  a  strong  stomach.  For  some  years  intestinal  dis- 
eases and  "enteric  fever,"  also  called  "Ithaca  fever" — an- 
other phase  of  the  polite  fiction  that  we  have  found  in  Cleveland — 
had  been  common.  In  the  winter  of  1902-1903  the  water  com- 
pany was  aroused  to  action  and  began  work  upon  a  dam  prepa- 
ratory to  installing  a  filtration  plant.  It  was  just  a  trifle  too 
late.  Whether  from  a  little  group  of  shanties  back  of  Six-Mile 
Creek,  which  had  been  throwing  slops  from  the  sick-rooms  of 
several  typhoid  patients  into  the  stream  emptying  close  to  the 
intake,  or  from  the  Italians  employed  on  the  dam  who  established 
their  sinks  within  a  few  yards  of  the  bank — an  illuminating  in- 
stance of  the  kind  of  protection  afforded  by  the  water  company 
— the  fever  appeared  in  epidemic  form  in  the  middle  of  January, 
1903.  By  the  time  the  disease  had  run  its  course,  there  were 
1,380  known  cases  out  of  a  population  of  15,800;  more  than  one  to 
every  dozen  inhabitants.  Happily,  the  fever  was  not  one  of  the 
most  virulent  type;  only  about  eight  per  cent,  of  the  reported 
cases  died.  But  even  with  that  low  rate,  the  mortality  reached 
the  appalling  ratio  of  nearly  725  per  100,000. 

Early  in  the  trouble  Cornell  University  assumed  a  prominent 
part  in  the  management  of  affairs.  Fortunately,  the  water  of 
the  campus,  supplied  by  a  separate  system,  was  not  contaminated, 
though  it  was  far  from  clear;  so  that  among  those  students  who 
used  the  campus  water  exclusively  there  were  no  cases.  Only  a 
small  part  of  the  student  body,  however,  lives  on  the  college 
grounds.  The  rest  are  scattered  around  them.  The  disease  early 
appeared  among  them.  Therefore,  it  was  only  natural  that 
President  Schurman  and  the  trustees  of  the  university  should 
have  taken  an  active  interest.  Unhappily  this  took  the  form  of 
minimizing  the  peril,  a  policy  which  may  well  have  cost  a  num- 
ber of  lives.  It  is  but  fair  to  the  university  authorities  to  say 
that  at  this  time  they  utterly  failed  to  appreciate  the  gravity  of 
the  situation.  While  the  health  authorities  were  warning  the 
public  in  terms  which  seemed  to  the  university  "sensational," 
there  emanated  from  Cornell  reassuring  statements.  The  atti- 
tude of  the  institution  was,  frankly,  that  there  was  no  great 
danger.  It  strove  to  allay  the  rising  panic,  "in  the  interests  of 
the  college,"  just  as  Cleveland,  St.  Louis  and  other  cities  have 
kept  down  their  typhoid  rates  "for  the  good  of  the  city,"  but 
with  this  difference,  that  the  institution  must  be  credited  with 
insistence  upon  the  utmost  precautions. 

In  the  latter  part  of  February  the  State  Board  of  Health  looked 
into  the  situation  at  Ithaca,  and  its  official  head  was  closeted  for 
some  time  with  President  Schurman.  Immediately  after  this 
conference  the  following  statement  was  given  out  in  pamphlet 
form  from  the  president's  office: 

"Dr.  Daniel  Lewis,  the  State  Commissioner  of  Health,  who  is 
here  to-day,  after  having  studied  the  siutation  carefully  from 


274:  Socialism  Inevitable 

every  side,  makes  the  statement  that  the  plans  which  are  already 
in  operation,  and  which  are  this  day  being  extended  by  the  city 
authorities,  make  it  perfectly  safe  for  anyone  to  return  to  Ithaca 
who  so  desires." 

At  this  time  there  were  400  to  500  fever  cases  in  the  city;  new 
cases  were  appearing  in  large  numbers  every  day,  and  every 
weary  and  over-worked  physician  in  the  place  knew  that  never 
had  the  disease  been  less  under  control.  Some  misconception 
seems  to  have  entered  into  the  conference  between  Dr.  Schurman 
and  Dr.  Lewis,  for,  as  soon  as  the  optimistic  pamphlet  appeared, 
the  local  board  of  health  wired  the  State  Commissioner,  asking 
if  he  were  willing  to  go  on  record  as  saying  that  students 
might  safely  return  to  town.  Response  came  promptly;  he  was 
not.  Until  certain  measures  should  have  been  taken  he  would 
not  regard  it  as  safe.  Thereupon  the  pamphlet  was  withdrawn 
from  circulation  and  another  substituted. 

The  Cornell  Infirmary,  to  which  many  of  the  students  were 
taken,  was  under  lay  management.  There  seems  to  have  been 
little  regard  for  professional  opinion.  One  member  of  the  medical 
faculty  of  Cornell  resigned  from  the  managing  committee  because 
the  "opinions  of  a  physician  were  not  worthy  of  the  consideration 
of  the  laymen  of  the  committee."  Another  was  rebuked  in 
writing  because  he  took  a  member  of  the  New  York  Cornell 
medical  faculty  to  the  hospital,  which  seems,  curiously  enough, 
to  be  against  the  rules.  At  a  time  when  all  the  obtainable  aid 
was  necessary,  the  medical  faculty  was,  as  far  as  possible,  ex- 
cluded from  any  direction  of  the  infirmary.    The  result: 

Percentage  of  deaths  to  cases  among  students  treated  at  the 
Cornell  Infirmary,  11.5;  percentage  of  deaths  to  cases  among 
students  treated  at  the  City  Hospital,  6.7. 

Conditions  of  overcrowding  and  the  class  of  patients  considered 
were  the  same.  That  nearly  seventy-five  per  cent,  more  cases 
were  lost  in  the  Cornell  institution  than  in  the  City  Hospital 
may  fairly  be  regarded  as  the  measure  of  difference  between 
efficient  and  inefficient  management.  Finally,  the  death  rate  of 
the  infirmary  was  one  and  one-half  per  cent,  higher  than  that  of 
outside  non-hospital  treatment.  That  is,  putting  it  barely,  it 
was  somewhat  better  not  to  go  to  a  hospital  at  all  than  to  trust 
to  the  management  of  the  well-meaning  trustees  of  the  university 
institution. 

For  six  weeks  the  epidemic  raged;  then  subsided,  though  its 
effects  were  felt  far  into  the  summer.  The  stricken  town  had 
time  to  consider.  Investigation  followed.  As  I  have  said,  the 
testimony  does  not  make  pleasant  reading.  It  proved,  with 
iterated  and  heaped-up  evidence,  that  the  water  company  was 
either  culpably  ignorant  or  culpably  negligent  of  the  water-shed 
which  had  been  intrusted  to  its  care.  On  my  visit  to  Ithaca  I 
asked  several  representative  citizens  what  was  done  with  the 
responsible  managers  of  the  company.    They  seemed  surprised. 

"Nothing,"  they  said. 

"Was  no  attempt  made  to  call  them  to  account ?" 


Municipal  Ownership — Its  Meaning  275 

"Certainly  not." 

"Weren't  they  even  indicted?" 

"Indicted?  Why,  the  very  best  people  in  town  were  in  that 
water  company.*  Our  leading  financiers,  merchants,  church 
members,  etc."  (The  list  is  a  familiar  one;  it's  the  same  kind 
of  list  that  one  finds  owning  the  disease-breeding  tenements  in 
Chicago,  New  York,  and  Philadelphia.) 

Punishment  did  follow  the  crime,  however.  But  not  the  crime 
of  poisoning  the  water,  the  crime  of  honestly  attempting  to 
let  people  know  the  truth  of  their  peril.  A  member  of  the 
faculty  of  Cornell  University  printed  in  the  local  paper  which 
he  owned  the  facts  of  the  typhoid  epidemic.  Warned  that  he  was 
jeopardizing  his  university  interest  by  this  course,  that  the 
policy  of  the  university  "deprecated  sensational  reports  tending 
to  incite  alarm,"  he  replied  that  the  policy  of  his  paper  was  to 
tell  the  truth  as  it  appeared.  After  the  scourge  had  passed, 
this  man  found  himself  persona  non  grata  with  the  controlling 
interests  of  the  institution.  Owing  to  the  unusual  success  of  his 
department,  he  was  in  line  for  a  full  professorship.  Now  he 
learned  that  as  long  as  he  remained  at  the  head  of  the  depart- 
ment it  would  continue  to  be  merely  an  assistant  professor's  de- 
partment.   He  resigned. 

One  of  the  Ithaca  physicians  has  for  years  been  connected  with 
Cornell  University  on  the  medical  side.  When  Cornell  began  its 
policy  of  optimism  at  the  height  of  the  epidemic,  this  physician 
took  the  other  side.  Optimism  seemed  to  him  out  of  place  under 
the  circumstances.  He  supported  the  policy  of  the  local  health 
board.  Despite  warnings,  he  continued  to  hold  to  his  course. 
Toward  the  end  of  the  year  his  friends  learned  that  he  need  not 
expect  a  reappointment  to  the  university  staff.  To  save  himself 
humiliation  he  resigned.  Other  cases  might  be  cited  where  the 
outspoken  were  penalized  socially,  commercially  and  even  po- 
litically. 

Ithaca  has  learned  its  lesson  now;  witness  the  vote  of  1,335 
for  municipal  ownership.  Cornell  has  its  own  filtration  plant, 
which  bears  Carnegie's  name,  in  agreeable  variation  to  the  long 
line  of  libraries. 

I  quote  the  case  of  Ithaca  at  length  because  it  must  at  once 
be  admitted  that  if  a  place  with  as  high  a  standard  of  intel- 
ligence as  this  university  city  finds  it  impossible  to  get  pure 
water  under  private  ownership,  how  much  more  impossible 
must  it  be  for  our  large  cities  with  a  much  lower  standard  of 
intelligence  ? 


*  The  secretary  and  treasurer  of  Cornell  University  was  at  that 
time  a  director  of  the  water  company;  several  of  the  university 
trustees  had  been  directors  up  to  within  a  short  time,  and  their 
families  were  still  financially  interested  in  the  company. 


276  Socialism  Inevitable 

This  case  also  illustrates  the  demoralization  of  university  life 
itself  as  the  result  of  the  private  ownership  of  Cornell  Univer- 
sity. It  is  true  that  Cornell  is  not  operated  for  the  sake  of 
profit,  but  it  is  true,  on  the  other  hand,  that  such  was  the 
fear  of  the  diminution  of  prestige  and  income  owing  to  the 
students  leaving  if  they  should  gain  knowledge  of  a  bad 
water  supply,  that  President  Schurman  was  willing  to  sup- 
press the  information  and  fatally  risk  the  lives  of  his  students. 
So  that  the  public  is  not  only  dissatisfied  with  private  owner- 
ship of  public  utilities  because  of  the  bad  service  rendered,  but 
it  has  another  and  deeper  grievance — namely,  the  corruption 
of  public  officials  by  the  private  corporations. 

It  is  notorious  that  practically  all  our  larger  American 
cities  are  each  in  the  control  of  a  boss  who  derives  his  political 
power  from  the  private  corporations  which  own  the  public 
utilities.  This  boss  often  has  control  of  the  machinery  of 
not  only  one,  but  both  of  the  great  political  parties.  The 
mayor  and  the  aldermen  are  his  creatures.  Dependent  upon 
him  for  their  places,  the  least  infraction  of  his  wish  means 
the  loss  of  their  political  heads.  The  boss  deals  directly  with 
the  gas  company  when  it  wishes  to  lay  more  mains  or  to  do 
anything  requiring  political  action  or  consent,  such  as  the 
acquiring  of  a  new  franchise.  The  same  is  true  of  the  electric 
light  company,  the  street  car  company,  the  telephone  com- 
pany, and  the  various  other  companies  owning  public  utilities. 
The  boss  directly  or  indirectly  gets  money  from  the  corpora- 
tions and  has  the  power  not  only  of  appointment  to  political 
offices  of  the  city,  but  also  to  many  positions  with  the  corpora- 
tions. Boss  Cox,  for  instance,  can  get  his  man  a  place  upon 
the  police  force  of  Cincinnati,  or  as  a  street-car  conductor  or 
a  lineman  with  the  telephone  company,  with  equal  facility. 

The  control  of  a  man's  job  means  very  nearly  the  control 
of  his  life,  and  hence  it  is  not  surprising  that  the  giving  of 
so  small  a  commodity  as  one's  vote  to  the  boss  in  exchange  for 
work  is  a  very  ordinary  and  usual  transaction  with  many 
thousands  of  our  fellow  citizens. 

The  private  corporations,  moreover,  are  under  compulsion 
to  play  politics  as  much  in  order  to  prevent  themselves  being 
blackmailed  as  they  are  to  gain  illegal  rights.  Buying  the 
good  graces  of  the  boss  is  never,  of  course,  entered  upon  the 
books  of  a  company  in  such  a  manner  that  the  uninitiated 


Municipal  Ownership — Its  Meaning  277 

would  know  what  the  money  went  for.  Legal  expense  is  a 
broad,  elastic  term  that  can  cover  all  such  underground  dis- 
bursements. 

Now  while  the  facts  of  corruption  by  our  private  corpora- 
tions are  not  denied,  the  opponents  of  municipal  ownership 
reply  that  if  the  public  officials  of  to-day  are  so  easily  cor- 
rupted, what  hope  is  there  in  putting  still  more  power  into 
their  hands  ?  They  forget  that  the  source  of  corruption  is  in 
the  private  ownership  of  public  utilities  and  that  the  more 
these  utilities  are  municipalized,  the  more  will  the  corrupt- 
ing stream  be  narrowed.  When  one  impure  rivulet  poisons  a 
great  river,  and  gives  a  city  an  epidemic  of  typhoid  fever,  it  is 
no  argument  against  purifying  the  other  contributory  rivulets, 
but  is  a  concrete  argument  for  the  purifying  of  the  rivulet 
that  is  doing  the  mischief;  so  that  when  we  find,  notwith- 
standing the  municipal  ownership  of  certain  utilities,  cor- 
ruption still  continues,  our  remedy  is  not  to  stop  our  work, 
but  to  still  further  pursue  our  purifying  process. 

For  instance,  C.  E.  Eussell,  in  Everybody's  Magazine,  de- 
clares that  the  Beef  Trust  in  Chicago  to-day  takes  millions 
of  gallons  from  the  city  water  mains  without  making  any 
payment.  It  has  bribed  the  city  officials  to  wink  at  the 
stealing.  This  certainly  shows  a  state  of  corruption  in 
Chicago's  waterworks,  notwithstanding  municipal  ownership. 
But  who  does  the  corrupting  ?  Is  it  not  owing  to  the  private 
ownership  of  the  other  public  utilities,  such  as  the  gas  works, 
the  street  cars,  the  telephones,  and  particularly  the  stock 
yards  ? 

In  many  European  cities  every  one  of  these  public  utilities 
is  municipally  owned,  so  to  advocate  the  same  by  our 
American  cities  is  proposing  no  untried  experiment.  Eegard- 
ing  the  saving  to  the  individual  under  public  ownership,  I 
need  only  say  that  wherever  there  is  municipal  ownership, 
the  price  of  gas,  of  water,  of  telephones,  of  street-car  trans- 
portation, etc.,  is  lower  than  under  private  ownership,  and 
that  the  service  is  nearly  always  better.  But  I  must  return 
to  my  original  reason  for  prophesying  that  municipal  owner- 
ship is  sure  to  be  the  next  great  and  successful  political 
movement  in  the  United  States;  namely,  because  it  tends  to 
effect  a  wider  and  more  equitable  distribution  of  the  wealth 
of  the  country. 


278  Socialism  Inevitable 

Man  is  a  land  animal,  and  land  is  his  first  requisite  for  ex- 
istence. Next,  however,  he  must  have  the  tools  wherewith 
to  work  the  land. 

In  colonial  days,  man's  tools  were  primitive.  He  had  a 
pine  knot  for  his  gasworks,  he  had  a  gourd  for  his  water  works, 
he  had  his  donkey  for  his  street-car,  he  had  his  own  knife 
and  his  own  back  yard  for  his  stock  yards.  These  tools  were 
his  own,  and  he  could  use  them  without  asking  any  man's  or 
any  trust's  permission.  Land  was  his  for  the  walking  to  the 
westward  a  few  miles.  The  American  then  was  indeed  a  free 
man,  who  owed  no  man  obeisance.  But  to-day,  if  he  would 
use  land,  he  must  first  ask  permission  of  an  Astor;  if  he 
would  have  light  and  heat,  he  must  ask  permission  of  a 
^Rockefeller;  if  he  would  go  from  place  to  place,  he  must 
bend  the  knee  to  a  Vanderbilt,  and  so  on,  indefinitely. 

Man  has  always  resented  serfdom,  his  eternal  struggle  has 
been  for  liberty;  and  so  to-day  the  struggle  is  for  economic 
liberty,  for  liberty  to  use  the  earth,  to  use  the  tools  necessary 
to  produce  wealth,  without  asking  the  leave  of  an  owner. 

Municipal  ownership  to  the  extent  that  it  gives  men  the 
ownership  of  certain  tools — to  wit,  water  works,  gas  works, 
street  cars,  telephones,  etc. — frees  man  from  bending  the 
knee  to  private  owners,  and  to  that  extent  is  an  onward 
step  toward  the  emancipation  of  man  from  thraldom  to  man. 

It  is  because  municipal  ownership  is  such  a  forward  step 
that  it  is  bound  to  be  made,  for  the  course  of  man  has  ever 
been  onward.  But,  after  all,  one  must  always  remember  that 
it  is  but  a  step  to  the  goal  of  complete  economic  freedom 
and  of  the  abolition  of  poverty.  Municipal  ownership  is  not 
itself  a  goal. 


Money  Undek  Socialism  279 


MONEY  UNDER  SOCIALISM 

(February,  1906.) 

MONEY  should  be  merely  a  tool  to  facilitate  exchange. 
Supposing  I  am  a  conductor  on  a  passenger  train, 
the  time  I  give  to  the  community  on  this  work  should 
be  recompensed  by  the  community  giving  me  the  time  of 
another  man,  or  the  part  time  of  a  number  of  men,  equal  to 
what  I  have  myself  expended.  I  have  created  no  product  that 
is  of  value  to  me,  but  I  have  performed  work  of  value  to 
society,  so  that  if  I  work  ten  hours  on  the  railroad  train,  I 
should,  in  equity,  be  able  to  command  the  product  of  ten 
hours  of  labor  from  other  men. 

Now  suppose  I  have  performed  my  ten  hours'  work  and  want 
some  sugar,  some  cloth,  and  some  potatoes.  The  railway  com- 
pany gives  me  a  five  dollar  gold  piece  for  my  time,  and  with 
this  money  I  buy  the  sugar,  cloth  and  potatoes  wanted.  The 
gold  in  the  five  dollars  required  a  certain  amount  of  labor  in 
its  production,  and  the  general,  but  quite  erroneous  assump- 
tion is  that  the  labor  time  involved  in  getting  the  gold  out  of 
the  ground  and  refining  it,  is  about  equivalent  to  the  labor 
time  involved  in  producing  the  sugar,  cloth  and  potatoes 
which  I  get  for  the  gold  piece,  or  the  time  I  worked  on  the 
train,  viz.,  ten  hours.  In  other  words,  it  is  assumed  that  the 
gold  piece  merely  enables  me  to  get  a  fair  equivalent  in  goods 
that  I  want,  calculating  the  value  by  the  labor  of  others,  in 
exchange  for  the  time  I  spend  as  conductor  upon  the  passenger 
train. 

If  this  exchange  of  labor  for  labor  were  really  made,  then 
there  would  be  no  complaint  about  the  equity  of  our  present 
competitive  system;  but  as  a  matter  of  fact,  the  exchange  is 
not  made  in  that  manner  at  all.  It  is  assumed  that  if,  instead 
of  my  working  ten  hours  on  the  railway,  I  should  spend  ten 
hours  in  a  gold  mine,  the  time  so  spent  would  produce  on 
an  average  about  five  dollars  worth  of  gold,  which  I  would 
get.    But  I  would  soon  find  that  all  the  good  gold  mines  are 


280  Socialism  Inevitable 

owned  by  private  individuals,  and  that  I  would  not  be  free  to 
dig  where  I  wanted.  Besides,  even  if  there  were  good  ground 
open,  it  would  require  a  great  outlay  of  capital  in  the  con- 
struction or  installation  of  tunnels,  hoisting  machines,  smelt- 
ers, railways  to  carry  the  ore,  etc.,  etc.,  before  I  would  be  able 
to  use  the  ground.  So  to  work  on  rich  ground  with  proper 
tools  I  would  be  obliged  to  hire  myself  out  to  a  mining  com- 
pany. 

Of  course  there  are  thousands  in  the  mining  districts  of  the 
West  who  work  on  their  own  hook,  with  no  more  expenditure 
of  capital. than  that  required  for  a  pick  and  pan;  they  occupy 
the  poorer  ground,  or  the  tailings,  and  earn,  on  an  average, 
about  what  they  would  get  if  they  hired  out.  If  they  worked 
for  one  of  the  big  companies  they  might  produce  from  three 
to  fifty  times  as  much,  but  the  increased  production  would  do 
them  little  good  since  it  would  go  to  the  owners.  Wages,  in 
short,  are  just  about  the  same  whether  the  mine  pays  big 
profits  or  no  profits  at  all. 

So  we  find  that  the  independent  miner,  with  no  machinery 
and  poor  land,  gets  about  as  much  as  if  he  were  working  for 
a  mining  company,  though  it  by  no  means  follows  that  his 
wages  are  fixed  by  the  average  production  per  capita  of  the 
whole  mining  camp.  This,  indeed,  may  be  as  much  as  fifty 
dollars  a  day,  while  the  average  wage  may  be  five  dollars  or 
even  less.  Needless  to  say,  the  owner  of  the  mines  absorbs 
the  difference. 

But  the  miner  not  only  receives  unfair  treatment  in  the 
matter  of  remuneration  for  his  labor  but  is  robbed  when  he 
exchanges  his  gold  for  merchandise.  With  his  &Ye  dollars 
in  gold  he  buys  so  much  cloth,  sugar  and  potatoes,  but  upon 
every  one  of  those  articles  he  pays  a  monopoly  profit,  owing 
to  the  railway  charges  for  freight.  He  must  therefore  re- 
imburse the  producers  for  all  the  tribute  that  they  have  paid 
to  the  railways  for  the  carriage  of  the  goods,  which  includes 
excessive  charges  upon  the  wool  it  has  carried  from  the  farmer 
to  the  manufacturer,  upon  the  cloth  carried  from  the  manu- 
facturer to  the  retail  dealer,  and  lastly  upon  the  goods  shipped 
to  the  miner.  All  this  the  miner  must  pay  back  to  the  various 
producers  or  he  cannot  get  his  cloth. 

Furthermore,  if  any  machinery  manufactured  by  a  trust 
has  been  used  in  the  production  of  the  articles  he  buys,  of 


Money  Under  Socialism  281 

course  an  extra  charge  has  to  be  made  for  it,  which,  eventually, 
the  miner  must  stand  for.  Thus  he  must  reimburse  the 
farmer  for  the  excessive  price  he,  the  latter,  has  paid  the 
Agricultural  Machine  Trust  for  his  implements,  as  well  as 
for  the  excessive  freight  rates  upon  them  that  the  railways 
have  charged  to  even  up  for  the  high  prices  they  have  paid  the 
Steel  Trust  for  their  rails.  All  this,  of  course,  must  be  added 
to  the  price  of  the  potatoes  plus  another  exorbitant  freight 
charge  when  these  are  received  by  the  miner. 

But  the  Sugar  Trust,  not  to  be  behind  in  the  game,  also 
puts  up  its  price  far  beyond  the  labor  cost  of  production,  and 
when  the  miner  gives  up  his  gold  for  sugar,  he  must  pay  an 
extra  price  that  the  Trust  may  pay  its  dividends  on  watered 
stock. 

Hence  we  say  that  the  miner  is  not  only  robbed  in  the 
beginning  by  being  forced  to  take  only  five  dollars'  worth  of 
gold  when  he  may  have  produced  fifty  dollars  worth,  but  again 
when  he  spends  his  five  dollars,  inasmuch  as  he  has  to  pay 
tribute  to  almost  every  trust  in  the  country. 

Of  course,  he  must  also  pay  tribute  to  the  various  land- 
lords. Not  only  does  he  pay  the  landlord  for  the  ground  upon 
which  the  potatoes  are  raised,  but  he  pays  the  rent  of  the 
commission  agent's  store  in  the  great  city,  and  he  pays  the 
rent  of  the  commission  agent's  house ;  he  also  pays  a  monopoly 
price  for  not  only  his  own  gas,  but  for  the  gas  used  by  all  the 
people  who  are  engaged  in  selling  and  producing  his  cloth. 

Nevertheless,  the  amount  of  gold  the  miner  gets  as  wages 
determines  what  the  conductor  gets  as  his  wages,  and  if  the 
latter  were  not  satisfied  with  his  payment  and  felt  he  could 
get  fairer  treatment  by  going  to  the  mines,  he  would  imme- 
diately do  so ;  but  knowing  that  the  miner  is  as  badly  robbed 
as  he  is,  he  stays  on  his  railway  train. 

So  that  under  our  present  system  the  daily  wage,  while 
nominally  giving  to  the  wage-earner  the  equivalent  of  what 
he  produces,  in  reality  does  nothing  of  the  sort.  Socialists 
say  that  the  man  who  works  should  receive  the  just  equivalent 
of  his  labor  either  in  goods  of  his  own  production  or  of  other 
people's  production,  at  his  option. 


282  Socialism  Inevitable 


NEW  SHOES  FOR  OLD  BALLOTS 

(March,  1906.) 

DTJKING  the  decadence  of  the  Eoman  Empire  it  was 
customary  to  suppress  the  clamor  of  the  proletariat 
by  giving  them  free  bread  and  free  circuses — panem 
et  cir censes. 

Practically  the  same  thing  goes  on  to-day  in  New  York 
City.  There  are  a  few  dozen  men,  mostly  Tammany  "leaders," 
who  have  a  following  of  from  a  few  hundred  to  several  thou- 
sand, whom  they  entertain  during  the  summer  months  by 
taking  them  up  the  Hudson  river  for  excursions,  providing 
free  lunch  and  free  beer.  During  the  winter  free  clothing  is 
distributed. 

In  return  for  this  these  thousands  of  men  deliver  up  their 
votes  to  the  givers  of  the  excursions  and  food.  Then  the 
"leader"  sells  the  votes  to  Belmont  &  Co.  for  so  much  hard 
cash.  As  an  illustration  of  this,  I  take  the  following  from  the 
New  York  Sun,  February  7,  1906 : 

When  Congressman  Big  Tim  Sullivan  gave  a  Christmas  dinner 
the  5,000  participants  received  each  a  ticket  calling  for  a  pair  of 
shoes.    At  the  dinner  Big  Tim  said  to  his  constituents: 

"Boys,  I  think  we're  going  to  have  another  long  stretch  of 
mild  weather,  and  you  won't  need  the  shoes  as  much  now  as 
when  it  gets  good  and  cold  in  February." 

He  announced  that  the  shoes  would  be  given  out  on  February 
6th.  That  Tim  is  a  good  weather  prophet  was  the  unanimous 
opinion  of  the  Bowery  yesterday  afternoon  when  4,800  men,  each 
supplied  with  one  of  his  cards,  showed  up  at  the  club  house  at 
207  Bowery.  Each  man  except  two  one-legged  men,  who  took 
one  each,  got  a  good  pair  of  shoes  in  which  there  was  a  pair  of 
woolen  socks.  As  they  left  the  club  house  the  men  were  passed 
through  the  assembly  room  on  the  second  floor,  where  hot  coffee 
and  sandwiches  awaited  them.  Big  Tim  was  present  with  all  the 
other  Sullivans. 

It  is  not  for  Wilshire's  to  find  fault  with  these  poor 
men  who  exchange  their  votes  for  something  so  very  tangible 
as  a  pair  of  shoes,  while  the  world  excuses  the  hundreds  of 


New  Shoes  For  Old  Ballots  283 

thousands  who  give  away  their  votes  without  getting  anything 
at  all  for  them.  Shoes  and  free  sandwiches  are  certainly 
better  than  nothing. 

We  Americans  might  just  as  well  own  our  country  and  have 
a  guaranteed  yearly  income  of  $10,000  apiece,  instead  of  a 
chance  at  a  sandwich,  if  enough  of  us  would  only  mark  our 
ballots  right,  that  is,  if  the  majority  of  us  voted  for  the  Social- 
ist Party.  We  would  then  have  Socialism,  and  poverty  would 
be  abolished.  Meanwhile  we  don't  do  it,  and  the  greater  part 
of  us  throw  away  our  ballots  without  even  getting  the  pair 
of  shoes  which  Big  Tim  Sullivan  gives  his  constituents. 


284  Socialism  Inevitable 


WILSHIRE'S  AND  THE  CRISIS 

(March,   1906.) 

WILSHIRE'S  MAGAZINE  is  not  dwelling  upon  the 
approaching  unemployed  problem  because  it  thinks 
that  nothing  but  the  appearance  of  that  event  will 
bring  on  Socialism,  but  because  it  believes  an  unemployed 
problem  to  be  absolutely  inevitable. 

We  do  not  look  for  such  people  as  ordinarily  compose  the 
unemployed  army  which  is  always  with  us  to  be  revolutionists. 
We  know  that  those  who  have  made  a  failure  of  life  under  our 
present  competitive  system  are  not  likely  to  be  the  ones  who 
are  to  carry  on  most  of  the  work  of  Socialism.  But  we  do 
say  that  when  the  economic  crisis  comes,  and  hundreds  of 
thousands  of  men  are  hungry  for  the  first  time,  men  who 
have  heretofore  considered  themselves  successes  in  life — that 
these  will  be  the  very  finest  recruits  possible  for  our  Socialist 
army  of  the  future. 

Now  I  do  not  expect  to  see  misery  and  poverty  progress- 
ively increasing  and  so  finally  forcing  the  nation  to  revolt. 
As  a  matter  of  fact,  I  might  even  be  willing  to  admit  the 
claim  made  by  some  that  labor  is  possibly  better  off  to-day 
than  it  was  formerly,  and  that  its  condition  may  be  improving 
from  year  to  year.  It  is  not  progressive  misery  that  will 
stimulate  men  to  a  recognition  of  Socialism,  but  the  sudden 
transition  from  prosperity  to  hard  times. 

In  the  meantime,  in  order  that  the  work  may  be  done 
properly  when  the  crisis  comes,  we  Socialists  are  educating  the 
working  class  so  that  they  may  realize  how  to  act.  We  don't 
think  the  mass  of  men  will  act  unless  they  feel  impelled  to, 
and,  on  the  other  hand,  we  don't  think  that  they  will  then 
move  in  the  right  direction  unless  they  have  been  instructed. 
The  mission  of  the  Socialists  is  to  show  the  workingman  how 
the  competitive  system  robs  him  and  how  he  can  liberate 
himself  by  being  the  owner  of  the  machinery  of  production 
himself. 


Wilshire's  and  the  Crisis  285 

We  are,  of  course,  ready  to  admit  that  Socialism  can  come 
without  an  economic  crisis ;  but  we  believe  that  with  the  aid 
of  such  a  crisis  it  will  be  much  easier  to  convince  the  working 
class  of  the  desirability  of  the  change.  In  the  meantime, 
however,  we  Socialists  should  act  as  if  no  crisis  were  impend- 
ing.   Keep  pegging  along,  and  never  stop, 


286  Socialism  Inevitable 


STRIKE  TO  SET  THEM  FREE 

(April,    1906.) 

THE  secret  night  arrest  and  deportation  from  Colorado 
to  Idaho  of  Haywood,  Moyer  and  Pettibone,  of  the 
Western  Federation  of  Miners,  is  not  only  an  event  of 
the  greatest  interest  to  the  labor  movement  of  the  United 
States,  but  it  is  an  act  menacing  the  whole  fabric  of  our 
present  industrial  and  social  structure. 

Society  to-day  is  held  together  by  the  feeling  of  the  large 
majority  of  the  people  that  if  substantial  equity  is  not  done 
to  every  man  by  our  present  laws  and  customs,  it  is  about  as 
near  as  can  be  expected,  taking  one  thing  with  another. 

We  Socialists  know,  and  are  trying  to  make  the  people  see, 
that  the  present  economic  inequality  and  injustice  is  the 
direct  consequence  of  our  competitive  system,  and  that  the 
only  way  to  avoid  inequity  is  to  establish  Socialism,  but  it 
is  a  tedious,  slow  process  to  teach  the  people  the  economics  of 
Socialism. 

When  it  comes  to  a  question  of  the  people  deciding  the  life 
or  death  of  a  man,  however,  they  do  not  hesitate  a  single 
moment.  If  they  think  that  a  man  has  committed  a  crime 
against  either  an  individual  or  the  commonwealth,  there  is 
practically  a  consensus  for  his  execution.  If,  upon  the  other 
hand,  they  think  he  is  not  guilty,  they  have  no  hesitancy  in 
expressing  their  feelings  against  his  punishment.  The  com- 
mon instinct  of  humanity  is  aroused  at  the  thought  of  killing 
an  innocent  man,  no  matter  who  he  may  be,  and  when  the 
man  threatened  is  one  who  is  known  to  have  devoted  his  life 
to  the  good  of  his  fellows  and  has  not  only  committed  no 
crime,  but  is  picked  out  for  slaughter  merely  because  he  has 
devoted  himself  to  their  interests,  then  may  we  expect  a  great 
wave  of  indignant  protest  to  sweep  the  nation. 

Never  before  the  arrest  of  Haywood,  Moyer  and  Pettibone 
has  such  a  condition  as  this  ever  been  presented  to  the  Ameri- 
can nation.    The  nearest  approach  to  it  was  probably  when 


Strike  to  Set  Them  Free  287 

the  Southern  Confederacy  threatened  to  execute  a  number 
of  captured  Union  officers  upon  the  false  charge  that  they 
were  spies.  This  so  aroused  the  whole  North  that  Lincoln, 
in  response,  advised  the  Confederacy  that  he  would  execute 
certain  Confederate  officers,  then  held  in  captivity,  if  the 
South  should  carry  out  its  threat,  whereupon  the  latter 
changed  its  mind,  and  the  incident  was  over. 

The  execution  of  the  Anarchists  in  Chicago,  in  1886,  was 
similar  in  certain  respects  to  the  threatened  execution  of 
Moyer  and  Haywood,  with  the  exception  that  it  did  not  excite 
any  great  national  protest — first,  because  the  labor  movement 
was  not  developed  to  the  extent  that  it  is  to-day ;  and,  secondly, 
because  the  men  accused  had  associated  themselves,  in  the 
public  mind,  with  the  advocacy  of  bomb  throwing,  and  the 
public  felt  that  their  execution  was  only  a  matter  of  just 
retribution. 

On  the  whole,  however,  the  present  Haywood-Moyer-Petti- 
bone  case  is  upon  quite  a  different  footing.  The  labor  move- 
ment of  America  is  to-day  infinitely  better  organized  than  it 
was  twenty  years  ago ;  and  not  only  is  this  so,  but  the  people 
generally  have  had  so  many  striking  indictments  of  the  present 
capitalistic  system  by  such  writers  as  Lawson,  Sinclair,  Stef- 
fens,  Phillips,  and  others,  have  seen  so  many  of  their  idols 
fall,  like  Senator  Depew,  and  have  been  so  enlightened  by  ftie 
insurance  investigations  as  to  how  graft  permeates  our  whole 
political  and  industrial  structure,  that  they  no  longer  feel 
their  former  resentment  against  those  who  criticize  the  present 
state  of  society. 

Instead  of  looking  upon  America  as  the  perfection  of  all 
things,  as  we  did  in  1886,  and  looking  upon  the  man  who  found 
fault  as  one  quite  worthy  of  hanging,  we  now  place  our 
critics  on  the  pinnacle  of  public  esteem. 

Nor  do  we  have  the  same  respect  for  the  courts  that  we 
did.  We  can  no  longer  doubt  that  they  are  corrupt  and  venial 
and  that  the  money  interest  of  the  country  controls  them. 
Twenty  years  ago  the  courts  were  an  honored  institution. 

The  growth  of  Socialism,  furthermore,  has  made  such 
progress  that  thousands  of  people  are  to-day  ready  for  a 
Social  Kevolution,  and  eager  to  listen  to  the  words  of  a 
Eevolutionist,  where  twenty  years  ago  they  would  have 
mobbed  him. 


288  Socialism  Inevitable 

The  public  protest  to-day  against  the  treatment  of  Haywood 
and  Moyer  is  infinitely  greater  and  more  powerful  than  any 
similar  protest  in  the  past.  The  labor  unions  from  one  end 
of  the  country  to  the  other  are  making  the  case  of  Haywood 
and  Moyer  their  own.  At  this  writing  $200,000  have  been 
subscribed  for  the  defence  fund,  and  $1,000,000  more  can  be 
had,  if  necessary. 

As  Gov.  Gooding,  of  Idaho,  and  his  servile  judges  push  the 
trial  of  the  accused  men,  there  is  no  telling  how  high  public 
indignation  may  run.  No  one  can  say  that  this  event  may 
not  be  the  spark  which  will  inflame  the  American  people  to 
the  inevitable  Social  Revolution. 

The  greatest  crime  against  a  free  people  in  modern  history 
is  threatened  in  the  trial  of  Haywood,  Moyer  and  Pettibone. 
No  one  who  knows  anything  about  the  character  of  the  men 
and  the  circumstances  of  the  crime,  can  believe  that  they 
were  connected  with  the  assassination  of  Gov.  Steunenberg. 
The  trial  is  merely  an  attempt  on  the  part  of  the  mine  owners 
of  Idaho  and  Colorado  to  intimidate  the  labor  unions.  They 
think  that  the  hanging  of  the  leaders  will  mean  such  a  com- 
plete cowing  of  labor  that  capital  will  forever  have  it  at  its 
mercy.  If  the  working  class  of  America  do  not  make  their 
protest  sufficiently  vigorous  to  prevent  the  possibility  of  this 
judicial  crime,  then  the  execution  of  these  prominent  labor 
ieaders  may  be  but  the  beginning  of  a  series  of  "legal"  murders 
from  one  end  of  the  country  to  the  other.  The  time  for  us  to 
make  our  protest  is  now,  and  not  after  the  men  are  in  their 
coffins.  Let  indignation  meetings  be  held  from  Maine  to 
California.  Let  money  be  collected.  Let  parades  be  made 
in  our  great  cities,  parades  in  such  numbers  that  their  immense 
size  will  intimidate  the  capitalist  class  from  carrying  out 
their  infamous  program. 

If  the  trial  proceeds  and  such  a  terrible  event  as  conviction 
by  the  servile  minions  of  plutocracy  should  follow,  and  if  a 
single  one  of  our  Comrades,  Haywood,  Moyer  or  Pettibone, 
is  condemned,  it  should  be  the  signal  to  the  working  class  of 
America  to  rise — let  that  mark  the  date  for  the  beginning  of 
a  Great  National  Strike.  Then  let  every  workingman  who 
has  a  heart  in  his  breast  register  a  mighty  oath  that  not  a 
wheel  shall  turn  in  this  country,  from  ocean  to  ocean,  until 
the  verdict  is  set  aside,  and  every  one  of  the  accused  set  free. 


Strike  to  Set  Them  Free  289 

Let  our  factories  be  closed;  let  our  mills  stop  grinding  flour, 
and  our  bakeries  stop  baking  bread.  Let  there  be  a  complete 
paralysis  of  railway  transportation  and  telegraphic  informa- 
tion. Let  our  coal  mines  close,  and  let  us  die  of  hunger  and 
cold,  if  necessary,  to  make  our  protest  heeded. 

The  working  class  of  this  country  have  it  in  their  power 
to  say  to  the  plutocracy,  "You  shall  starve  to  death  if  a  hair 
on  the  head  of  either  Haywood,  Moyer  or  Pettibone  is  injured. 
Let  them  show  the  world  that  they  are  not  so  lost  to  shame, 
so  devoid  of  the  red  blood  of  courage,  that  they  will  allow  one 
of  their  comrades  to  suffer  death  at  the  hands  of  their  enemies, 
when  they  have  at  their  command  a  weapon  which  will  set 
them  free. 

Hurrah  for  the  General  Strike! 


290  Socialism  Inevitable 


ROOSEVELTS  MUCK  RAKE 

(April,  1906) 

1AM  in  agreement  with  the  President  on  the  muck-rake 
question  on  one  point  at  least,  namely,  that  the  problem 
now  is  rather  how  to  get  rid  of  the  muck  than  to  merely 
stir  it  up  and  leave  it  a  stench  to  the  nostrils.  Everyone  knows 
by  this  time  that  the  muck  is  here. 

President  Koosevelt  suggests  the  cause  of  the  muck  and 
likewise  the  remedy,  and  here  I  am  again  in  agreement  with 
him. 

He  says:  "Materially  we  must  strive  to  secure  a  broader 
economic  opportunity  for  all  men,  so  that  each  shall  have  a 
better  chance  to  show  the  stuff  of  which  he  is  made." 

That's  good  Socialistic  doctrine  and  pretty  nearly  what  I 
say  myself.  "Let  all  men  have  an  equal  economic  oppor- 
tunity," is  the  way  I  would  have  put  it. 

"Muck"  exists  because  some  men  have  a  much  better  oppor- 
tunity than  others  and  can  buy  or  bully  their  fellows  into 
economic  submission.  For  instance,  Vanderbilt  owns  a  rail- 
way which  gives  him  a  superior  economic  opportunity.  With 
this  he  extorts  "muck"  from  the  public,  and  with  the  "muck" 
he  buys  our  legislators,  who  make  his  man,  Depew,  a  Senator. 
The  "muck-rake"  man  then  comes  along,  tells  the  public  all 
about  the  transaction,  stirs  up  the  muck,  and  leaves  us  with 
our  handkerchiefs  to  our  noses  to  find  out  how  much  better 
we  are  off  than  we  were  before.  Nevertheless,  he  makes  us 
sure  that  the  muck  is  there.  Now  the  President  is  not  this 
kind  of  a  muck-raker.  When  he  rakes  muck  he  knows  where 
he  is  going  to  dump  it.  Not  only  is  he  going  to  show  us  how 
to  get  rid  of  the  muck,  but  he  also  purposes  to  show  us  how 
to  prevent  future  accumulations.  President  Eoosevelt  clearly 
sees  the  source  of  muck  to  be  in  the  existence  of  large  fortunes ; 
in  the  ownership  of  our  railways  by  a  Vanderbilt,  our  oil 
refineries  by  a  Kockefeller,  our  sugar  refineries  by  a  Have- 


Roosevelt's  Muck  Bake  291 

meyer,  etc.  He  tells  us  that  we  must  take  these  properties 
away  from  them,  not  now,  but  soon,  when  they  die. 

I  quote  again :  "We  must  have  a  tax  to  put  it  out  of  the 
power  of  the  owners  of  these  immense  fortunes  to  pass  on  more 
than  a  certain  amount  to  any  one  individual." 

Now  it  seems  to  me  that  if  I  found  a  muck  heap  under 
my  window  I  would  not  wait  until  somebody  died  before  try- 
ing to  remove  it.  I  would  rake  off  the  muck  at  once.  Why 
endure  the  stench  a  moment  longer  than  necessary?  If 
Roosevelt  sees  that  private  ownership — an  overgrown  fortune 
— of  wealth  causes  the  muck,  then  he  has  no  more  right  to  ask 
us  to  wait  for  the  owner  to  die  than  he  would  have  to  ask  a 
city  to  continue  drinking  water  known  to  be  polluted  with 
typhoid  germs  coming  from  the  drainage  of  certain  houses 
because  the  owners  of  the  houses  were  not  yet  dead. 

It  may  be  true  that  the  greater  the  fortune  the  more  the 
muck;  yet  it  is  also  true  that  even  a  very  little  muck  is  dis- 
agreeable just  as  the  slightest  attack  of  typhoid  fever  would 
be.  No  one  would  advise  letting  even  one  house  drain  into  and 
pollute  a  city's  water  supply.  No  one  would  allow  the  smallest 
amount  of  muck  in  his  house  if  he  could  throw  it  out.  If 
small  fortunes  give  an  economic  opportunity  to  the  class  that 
own  them  to  create  even  a  little  muck,  while  we  are  cleaning 
house,  why  not  do  it  thoroughly? 

Let  us  do  away  with  all  fortunes  and  all  muck,  and  do 
away  with  them  at  once.  Let  the  Nation  Own  the  Fortunes, 
both  big  and  little,  the  big  railways  and  the  small  railways. 
Let  the  muck-raker  gather  them  all  in.  Let  us  have  a  clean 
house. 


292  Socialism  Inevitable 


EFFECT  OF  THE  EARTHQUAKE  ON 
SOCIALISM 

(May,  1906.) 

THE  earthquake  in  California  by  the  destruction  of  some 
hundreds  of  millions  of  dollars  of  property  will  help 
enormously  toward  continuing  "prosperity"  in  this 
country.  What  the  present  competitive  system  needs  above 
all  things  else  is  a  "market,"  and  the  earthquake  will  force 
California  to  be  the  largest  and  best  buyer  in  the  world  for 
the  next  two  years.  She  will  not  only  have  the  hundreds  of 
millions  of  insurance  money  to  spend,  but  will  borrow  millions 
in  addition.    There  will,  in  fact,  be  no  shortage  of  money. 

I  have  been  saying  that  unless  we  should  have  a  great 
war  this  country  will  witness  a  profound  period  of  depression 
within  two  years,  the  result  of  an  inevitable  overproduction. 
But  I  did  not  count  on  an  earthquake.  I  now  wish  to  extend 
the  time :  the  California  earthquake  should  put  off  the  crisis 
at  least  one  year  longer.  In  the  meantime  there  should  be 
a  great  boom  in  the  stocks  of  all  kinds  of  railways  and  in- 
dustrial corporations,  and  in  real  estate.  Even  land  values 
in  San  Francisco  will  rise  far  beyond  the  values  that  obtained 
before  the  earthquake. 

There  is  now  some  twaddle  being  uttered  to  the  effect  that 
San  Francisco  may  not  be  rebuilt  because  people  will  be 
afraid  to  live  there.  The  man  who  talks  this  way  must  have 
a  theory  that  people  choose  their  place  of  residence  because 
of  their  health,  whereas,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  they  do  so  in 
order  to  get  a  living. 

San  Francisco  is  the  natural  port  of  the  Pacific  slope,  and 
has  the  best  harbor  in  the  world.  With  such  advantages  it 
will  always  pay  men  to  trade  there,  and  men  will  always  be 
found  where  there  is  good  pay. 

If  danger  were  to  keep  men  away  from  their  occupations, 
there  would  be  few  men  working  in  our  white  lead  factories, 
our  coal  mines,  or  in  tunnel  work  under  rivers.    Does  the  fact 


Effect  of  the  Earthquake  on  Socialism       293 

that  tens  of  thousands  of  men  are  annually  killed  and  injured 
upon  our  railways  prevent  the  companies  from  securing  as 
many  employees  as  they  want?  San  Francisco  might  have 
an  earthquake  every  month,  and  yet  there  would  be  no  diffi- 
culty in  hiring  all  the  men  required. 

The  aid  extended  from  all  parts  of  the  world  to  the  stricken 
people  in  California  shows  how  strong  is  the  instinct  of 
brotherhood  resting  latent  in  the  breast  of  all  of  us.  It  also 
shows  that  this  brotherhood  does  not  stop  at  national  boundary 
lines,  as  Eoosevelt  by  his  refusal  of  foreign  aid  would  have 
it  do.  Without  that  instinct  the  world  indeed  would  be  a 
chaos.  On  the  other  hand,  the  necessity  of  martial  law  to 
prevent  the  looting  of  the  ruins  shows  that  the  competitive 
system  has  so  deeply  demoralized  men  that  they  will  take 
advantage  of  one  another  even  in  such  a  state  of  universal 
calamity.  The  earthquake  has  shown  at  once  both  the  best 
and  the  worst  in  us. 


P.   S. — Probably  no  prediction   I  ever  made    was    received    with    more    scorn 
only  to  be  triumphantly  fulfilled  than  the  foregoing. — G.  W.,    Dec.  14,  1907. 


294  Socialism  Inevitable 


FEUDALISM  VERSUS  CAPITALISM  IN 
RUSSIA 

(May,  1906.) 

THE  time  is  ripe  in  Russia  for  Capitalism  to  displace 
Feudalism.  Her  industries  are  now  far  enough  ad- 
vanced absolutely  to  require  Capitalism  for  further 
development,  though  hardly  far  enough  to  require  Socialism. 
Feudalism  was  good  enough  for  society  when  there  were  no 
railroads  or  factories;  but  with  the  growth  of  capital,  as  the 
result  of  the  invention  and  use  of  the  steam  engine,  and  of 
various  labor-saving  devices,  the  system  of  Capitalism,  as  we 
know  it,  has  been  developed.  Yet  the  capitalistic  class  in 
Russia  is  a  comparatively  new  class  of  men.  The  oFd  ruling 
class,  the  nobility  and  land  owners,  are  now  sneering  and 
looking  down  upon  them,  but  just  as  soon  as  the  value  of 
capital  outweighs  that  of  the  land,  the  capitalists  will  domin- 
ate the  land  owners,  and  Capitalism  will  supplant  Feudalism 
as  it  has  done  elsewhere  throughout  Europe. 

That  the  Russian  government,  however,  neither  understands 
nor  foresees  all  this  is  certain,  as  is  shown  by  the  following 
trivial  but  suggestive  incident,  recorded  in  the  daily  press : 

The  Communal  Court  at  Widzewo  has  ordered  the  Messrs. 
Coates,  thread  manufacturers,  to  pay  their  800  employees  for 
the  time  they  have  lost  since  December  30th,  when  the  factory 
was  closed,  until  to-day. 

The  Court  held  that  the  plea  offered  by  the  manufacturers  for 
closing  their  factory,  that  there  was  scarcity  of  coal,  was  in- 
sufficient reason  for  shutting  down  their  works,  as  coal  was 
obtainable  at  high  prices. 

It  seems  to  that  feudalistic  court  of  Widzewo  that  whether 
Coates  &  Company  make  money  or  not  they  should  run  their 
factory  merely  to  keep  their  men  employed  and  to  avoid  any 
disturbance  to  society.  The  fact  that  coal  is  high  in  price 
argues  nothing  to  the  court.  The  bankruptcy  of  capitalists 
like  Coates  &  Company  is  of  no  moment  compared  with  the 


Feudalism  vs.  Capitalism  in  Russia  295 

bankruptcy  of  the  feudal  system.  In  the  feudal  regime  there 
was  no  such  thing  as  people  starving  so  long  as  there  was 
food.  Starvation  then  came  from  famine  and  underproduc- 
tion :  to-day  it  -comes  from  people  being  out  of  work  merely 
because  capitalists  cannot  hire  them  at  a  profit.  And  such  a 
condition,  of  course,  is  quite  incomprehensible  to  those  who 
entertain  the  feudal  notion  of  things  as  does  the  Russian 
Government. 

Now  when  the  capitalists  supplant  the  land-owning  class 
as  the  controlling  force  in  politics,  there  will  be  no  more  such 
absurdity  as  ordering  a  manufacturer  to  run  his  mill  when  he 
cannot  do  so  without  losing  money.  In  other  words,  the 
capitalist  government,  unlike  the  present  feudal  regime,  will 
understand  what  is  possible  from  a  capitalist  standpoint. 
And  yet  this  increased  intelligence,  as  we  well  know  in  this 
country,  will  not  go  far  toward  feeding  the  unemployed 
laborer;  and  as  soon  as  the  laborer  understands  this,  he  will 
be  the  first  to  demand  the  abolition  of  the  capitalist  system 
itself,  and  the  inauguration  of  the  Socialist  system.  This  is 
what  is  now  happening  in  America  and  is  the  logical  sequence 
of  events  in  Russia. 

It  may  be  objected  that  the  Czar's  interference  with  the' 
affairs  of  the  Coates  Company  was  no  different  from  President 
Roosevelt's  interference  in  the  recent  coal  strike ;  yet  it  must 
be  borne  in  mind  that  in  one  case  the  Czar  ordered  the  capital- 
ists to  give  work,  whereas  Roosevelt  merely  suggested  that  it 
should  be  done. 

Roosevelt  indeed  has  no  power  beyond  mere  suggestion. 
The  assumption  that  the  President  is  the  head  of  the  nation 
is  quite  absurd.  The  time  when  our  political  officers  con- 
trolled things,  passed  away  with  the  appearance  of  our  Cap- 
tains of  Industry.  They  are  the  men  who  are  now  our  real 
political  leaders. 

To-day  the  man  that  can  give  valid  orders  that  laborers  shall 
or  shall  not  go  to  work  in  America,  as  does  the  Czar  in 
Russia,  is  not  Roosevelt,  he  is  the  capitalist,  the  man  who 
owns  the  machinery  of  production.  He  is  the  only  one  who 
is  in  position  to  make  his  order  effective.  For  instance, 
Mr.  Roosevelt  suggested  that  the  operators  arbitrate  with  the 
miners;  whereas  Mr.  Corey,  the  president  of  the  Steel  Trust, 


296  Socialism  Inevitable 

autocratically  ordered  them  to  do  so,  saying  that  if  they  did 
not  he  would  break  his  coal  contract. 

"The  Steel  Trust  must  have  coal,  and  you  must  pay  your 
workmen  sufficient  wages  to  get  it.  We  pay  you  enough  for 
your  coal,  and  we  will  not  allow  you  to  cut  us  off  and  make 
us  shut  down  our  steel  mills,  in  order  that  you  can  gouge  a 
little  more  profit  out  of  your  workingmen." 

This  order  from  Corey  to  Baer  was  imperative,  and  had 
immediate  effect,  whereas  the  suggestion  from  Eoosevelt  was 
received  with  considerable  irritation  by  many  of  the  coal 
operators  who  said  the  President  had  no  right  to  interfere. 
It  was  none  of  his  business;  but  when  Corey,  the  President 
of  the  Billion  Dollar  Steel  Trust,  spoke,  there  was  not  a 
single  coal  operator  that  dared  peep. 


Socialism:  A  Eeligion  297 


SOCIALISM:    A  RELIGION 

(June,  1906.) 

I  THINK  most  Socialists  will  agree  that  until  the  belief 
in  Socialism  gets  hold  of  the  hearts  and  emotions  of 
the  people  more  as  a  religion  than  as  an  understanding 
/  of  economic  events,  there  is  not  likely  to  be  a  Social  Kevolu- 
tion.  In  the  first  place,  the  economics  of  Socialism  are  not 
sufficiently  easy  of  explanation  to  the  general  public  for  us 
to  gain  a  large  following  in  any  short  period  of  time.  Men 
usually  have  taken  up  a  political  faith,  not  because  they 
have  arrived  at  it  from  a  course  of  logical  reasoning,  but 
because  they  have  gained  it  through  their  emotions.  This 
"admission,  however,  does  not  necessarily  imply  that  such 
faith  rests  on  a  false  foundation.     It  may  or  may  not. 

Every  period  of  depression  in  this  country  has  awakened 
a  feeling  of  revolt  among  the  ones  affected  injuriously,  and 
they  have  sought,  in  the  past,  to  remedy  their  ills  by  a  variety 
of  panaceas.  It  is  not  so  many  years  since  we  regarded 
greenbacks  as  the  great  and  only  remedy  for  human  ills. 
Later  on  we  pinned  our  hopes  to  Mr.  Bryan  and  free  silver. 
To-day  there  is  a  marked  tendency  among  the  people  to  place 
their  faith  in  Socialism.  In  each  case  the  method  by  which 
the  greater  part  of  the  believers  in  greenbacks,  free  silver,  and 
Socialism  arrived  at  their  conclusions,  was  much  more  through 
their  hearts  and  emotions  than  through  their  brains.  But 
because  we  have  been  wrong  at  least  twice,  it  does  not  follow 
that  now,  when  we  decide  upon  Socialism,  we  must  be  wrong 
for  the  third  time. 

It  has  been  rightly  said  that  it  is  much  easier  to  sympathize 
with  suffering  than  with  happiness;  that  is,  where  ten  men 
will  sympathize  with  you,  wishing  for  Socialism  because  it 
will  alleviate  suffering,  there  is  only  one  who  will  go  with 
you  because  it  promises  a  world  of  happiness  and  beauty. 

There  are  three  classes  of  men  to  whom  the  Socialist  ap- 
peals; first,  the  large  mass  of  humanity  who  wish  a  change 


298  Socialism  Inevitable 

because  they  themselves  are  actually  suffering  from  poverty. 
Second,  another  large  mass  of  people  who,  while  they  them- 
selves are  not  suffering  from  poverty,  wish  to  see  the  suf- 
ferings of  others  alleviated.  Third,  a  class,  and  a  very  much 
smaller  class,  who  picture  the  earth  made  into  one  divinely 
beautiful  garden  for  man  in  the  state  of  complete  happiness, 
and  who  are  Socialists  because  of  that  ideal. 

The  best  Socialist  is  one  who  can  not  only  sympathize 
with  poverty  and  wish  to  alleviate  it,  but  who  has  the  imag- 
ination to  see  the  world  of  beauty,  which  Socialism  promises, 
as  the  goal  to  be  reached. 

In  this  day  of  machine  production  it  is  not  difficult  to  show 
that  we  can  produce  more  than  enough  to  banish  poverty.  \ 
There  was  a  day  when  poverty  was  the  result  of  under-   I 
production,  famine,  and  war.     The  world  was  hungry  because  J 
there  was  not  enough  to  eat.     To-day,  hunger  and  want  ex- / 
ists  in  civilized  countries  not  because  there  is  not  enough/ 
produced,  but  because  we  don't  know  properly  how  to  distribi 
ute  the  product.     If  we  could  properly  distribute  what  we 
produce  without  at  the  same  time  checking  production,  no 
economist  would  deny  that  the  problem  of  poverty  could  be 
solved. 

Under  our  competitive  system  a  man  is  paid,  not  accord- 
ing to  what  he  produces,  but  according  to  what  he  may  sell 
his  labor  for  in  the  competitive  market.  The  employer  buys 
labor  just  as  he  buys  any  other  material.  If  he  is  making 
shoes  he  figures  out  how  much  the  labor  cost  is,  how  much 
the  leather  cost,  how  much  his  rent  and  interest  are,  etc. 
He  cannot  pay  higher  for  his  labor  than  his  competitors  dov 
any  more  than  he  can  pay  higher  for  his  leather,  that  is, 
not  if  he  expects  to  sell  his  shoes  against  them  in  competi- 
tion. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  man  who  sells  his  labor,  just  as  the 
man  who  sells  leather,  must  sell  at  the  market  rate;  other- 
wise he  cannot  dispose  of  his  product, — labor.  If  Jones 
offers  his  labor  for  $2.00  a  day  to  the  employer,  it  is  just  as 
hopeless  for  Smith  to  try  to  sell  his  labor  for  $2.50  as  it 
would  be  to  ask  $2.50  a  pound  for  leather  which  the  employer 
could  buy  for  $2.00.  If  there  are  plenty  of  men  who  are 
willing  to  sell  their  labor  at  $2.00  a  day  and  their  leather 
at  $2.00  a  pound,  then,  of  course,  the  price  of  leather,  or  of 


Socialism:  A  Keligion  299 

labor,  cannot  rise  above  $2.00.  There  are  always  men  out  of 
employment  in  the  United  States,  even  in  times  of  prosperity, 
so  that  it  is  futile  to  expect  that  wages  can  rise  very  much 
above  the  amount  demanded  by  the  unemployed,  which  is 
just  about  enough  to  keep  them  from  starving.  Hence,  under 
our  existing  conditions,  remuneration  to  the  workingman 
must  always  remain  approximately  at  the  very  point  of  sub- 
sistence, no  matter  how  much  more  than  a  subsistence  the 
worker  may  produce. 

The  reason  of  this  holding  down  of  wages  to  the  point  of 
bare  subsistence  is  the  competitive  system,  and  so  long  as 
that  system  exists,  the  workingmen  cannot  expect  to  get 
more,  at  best,  than  a  mere  living.  Hence,  no  matter  how 
much  we  may  increase  in  productivity,  the  laborer  will  find 
it  impossible  to  share  in  the  increase. 

The  average  annual  wage  to-day  is  somewhat  less  than 
$500  per  worker;  while  the  annual  product  has  been  estimated 
at  about  $2,000;  but  whether  it  be  $2,000  or  $20,000  makes 
no  difference  so  far  as  the  laborer  is  concerned,  because  under 
the  competitive  system  he  cannot  possibly  get  any  more  than 
this  living  wage  of  $500.  The  surplus  is  automatically 
dumped  into  the  laps  of  the  employing  class — into  the  hands 
of  the  owners  of  the  land  and  of  the  machinery  of  produc- 
tion. Of  course,  it  often  happens  that  some  individual  em- 
ployer may  get  very  little,  if  any,  of  this  surplus.  He  may 
have  to  part  with  all  his  profits  to  pay  his  landlord,  if  he  is 
a  manufacturer  in  the  city  of  New  York,  or,  if  he  is  a  farmer 
in  the  West,  he  may  be  forced  to  pay  his  gains  to  the  railroad, 
and  so  on. 

The  employing  class — the  capitalists — utilize  this  auto- 
matic surplus  from  the  product  of  the  laborer  in  two  ways. 
First,  they  spend  part  of  it,  and  secondly,  they  invest  part 
of  it.  We  may  pass  by  the  question  of  what  they  spend  as 
being  relatively  of  no  economic  importance  since  it  is  not  a 
channel  that  can  be  automatically  enlarged  in  times  of  emer- 
gency. It  is  the  investment  of  capital  in  savings  which  ab- 
sorbs a  great  part  of  the  surplus  product  of  labor.  This  is 
the  part  that  goes  to  build  our  railroads,  our  manufactories 
and  our  industrial  undertakings  as  a  whole.  It  is  the  oppor- 
tunity for  the  investing  of  savings  that  to-day  creates,  and 
is  responsible  for,  our  present  prosperity,    So  long  as  the 


300  Socialism  Inevitable 

capitalist  can  see  an  opportunity  for  the  profitable  investing 
of  his  surplus  he  will  invest,  which  means  that  he  will  con- 
tinue to  employ  labor,  build  new  railroads,  etc.;  but  let  it 
once  come  to  the  point  where  there  is  no  profit  to  be  made  in 
the  further  building  of  railroads,  or  of  oil  refineries,  then 
you  may  be  sure  that  he  will  stop.  This  is  the  situation  that 
the  Socialist  sees  will  sooner  or  later  confront  the  capitalist 
class,  viz.,  the  inability  to  invest  their  surplus,  and,  conse- 
quently, the  inability  to  employ  labor,  from  which,  of  course, 
a  great  unemployed  problem  must  ensue. 

It  might  be  thought  by  some  that  there  is  an  unlimited 
opportunity  for  the  building  of  new  machinery,  but  the 
Trust  is  in  evidence  as  a  contradiction  of  such  an  assump- 
tion. The  Trust  is  a  white  flag  hung  out  by  competitive 
capitalistic  armies  announcing  their  surrender  to  monopoly 
and  to  combination.  Over-production  threatens  their  ex- 
istence. 

But  the  Trust  is  only  a  temporary  remedy,  for  we  must 
bear  in  mind  that  all  this  industrial  equipment  is  for  the 
purpose  of  manufacturing  goods  to  be  distributed  to  the 
working  class  who,  according  to  our  original  analysis,  have 
only  about  $500  a  year  with  which  to  buy  the  product;  and 
as  under  the  competitive  system  this  $500  cannot  be  in- 
creased, it  is  not  at  all  difficult  to  see  how  man  with  modern 
machinery  can  produce  more  than  he  can  buy.  The  wonder 
is,  therefore,  not  that  we  are  threatened  with  over-production 
to-day,  but  that  we  were  not  overwhelmed  with  it  years  ago. 

We  must  remember,  however,  the  many  technical  improve- 
ments in  production,  which  have  been  so  revolutionary  that 
no  sooner  has  one  piece  of  machinery  been  purchased  than 
another  has  been  invented  to  take  its  place,  whereupon  the 
first  has  been  torn  down  and  the  new  one  installed,  thus 
giving  employment  to  labor.  But  this  building  of  new,  to 
supersede  old,  machinery  has  at  last  come  to  a  stop,  and 
the  Trust  is  the  sign  that  the  climax  has  been  reached. 

Two  years  ago  we  were  threatened  with  a  period  of  great 
depression,  but  along  came  the  Eusso-Japanese  war  to  dis- 
tribute goods  in  great  quantity,  and  at  the  same  time  to  draw 
more  than  a  million  men  from  the  labor  army  of  the  world, 
resulting,  of  course,  in  a  tremendously  increased  demand  for 
the  products  of  Western  Europe  and  of  the  United  States. 


Socialism:  A  Keligion  301 

The  San  Francisco  earthquake,  moreover,  will  have  a  ten- 
dency to  prolong  the  stimulus  given  by  the  war,  but  this 
stimulus  is  now  rapidly  wearing  off,  and  it  will  not  be  many 
months  before  there  is  a  decided  fall  in  prices  and  a  great 
decline  in  the  demand  for  labor.  This  means  that  a  great 
unemployed  problem  is  approaching,  and  that  the  nation, 
now  in  its  heyday  of  prosperity,  is  soon  to  be  confronted  with 
a  terrible  economic  crisis. 

In  the  previous  periods  of  depression  we  looked  to  super- 
ficial remedies  for  relief.  We  were  like  quacks  who  would 
attempt  to  cure  smallpox  by  treating  the  eruption.  But  the 
Socialist  sees  that  it  is  useless  to  try  to  alleviate  poverty  so 
long  as  the  cause  of  poverty,  viz.,  the  competitive  system,  is 
spared.  Hence  he  would  abolish  the  competitive,  and  sub- 
stitute the  co-operative  system,  which  merely  means  the  dis- 
tribution of  what  the  worker  produces,  rather  than  the  mini- 
mum upon  which  he  can  live.  To  do  this,  however,  it  is 
necessary  to  own  the  machinery  of  production;  that  is,  it 
would  be  absurd  to  try  to  establish  a  co-operative  common- 
wealth if  the  trusts  and  railroads  were  left  in  the  hands  of 
the  Gould- Vanderbilt-Harriman-Eockefeller-Astor  Company. 

It  is  necessary  for  us,  the  people  as  a  whole,  to  own  and 
operate  these  great  machines  of  production,  and  to  distribute 
the  product  to  ourselves  as  workers,  not  upon  the  basis  of 
how  little  we  can  use,  but  of  what  we  produce,  If  by  virtue 
of  modern  machinery  we  can  produce  one  hundred  times  our 
output  without  machinery,  then  let  us  have  a  product  one- 
hundredfold  greater,  instead  of  taking  only  ten  per  cent,  and 
allowing  ninety  per  cent,  of  it  to  rest  as  an  unused  accumu- 
lation in  the  hands  of  the  capitalists,  thereby  justifying  them 
in  saying  that  there  is  over-production  and,  consequently,  no 
opportunity  to  give  us  work. 

I  have  herein  sketched  the  economic  basis  of  Socialism, 
and  if  it  be  difficult  of  understanding  to  many  readers,  my 
original  contention  that  we  will  not  gain  the  day  through  an 
appeal  to  the  understanding  so  much  as  through  an  appeal 
to  the  heart,  will  have  been  amply  proved.  For  we  can  all  feel 
for  the  man  who  is  suffering  from  hunger,  and  can  see  the 
absurdity  of  his  being  hungry  merely  because  there  is  so 
much  bread  that  there  is  no  opportunity  to  hire  him  either  in 
the  wheat  fields,  the  flour  mill  or  the  bake  shop. 


302  Socialism  Inevitable 

Even  in  this  present  period  of  "prosperity/'  the  growth 
of  the  Socialistic  undercurrent  of  sentiment  is  apparent  to 
everyone,  not  only  in  the  increased  Socialistic  vote  in  all 
parts  of  the  world,  but  particularly  in  the  current  literature 
of  the  day.  By  this  I  refer  equally  to  the  exposures  of  graft 
that  are  filling  the  magazines,  and  to  the  writings  of  our 
Gorkys,  Tolstois,  Zolas,  Londons,  Sinclairs,  and  other  men  of 
genius  who  are  voicing  the  cry  of  the  disinherited. 

It  is  impossible  for  a  man  even  though  he  be  in  perfect 
health,  with  the  exception,  say,  of  a  crushed  ringer,  to  be 
happy  until  the  pain  from  his  ringer  has  departed,  and  human- 
ity is  just  as  much  a  living  organism  as  is  a  man's  body.     We 
cannot  have  a  single  member  of  our  great  organization  hurt 
without  all  of  us  suffering,  just  as  the  man  with  the  crushed 
finger  feels  pain  throughout  his  body,  although  only  his  ringer 
is  affected.     Even  the  most  hard-hearted  of  men  will  admit 
that  he  could  not  sit  down  to  eat  his  dinner  with  any  pleasure 
and  have  alongside  of  him  a  hungry  man  who,  because  of 
poverty,  could  not  share  his  food.    Fundamentally,  it  is  just 
as  much  an  instinct  to  relieve  a  brother's  distress  as  to  relieve 
7the  pain  of  a  crushed  finger,  and  Socialists,  recognizing  tl 
/interdependence  of  humanity,  calls  upon  it  to  further  the 
I  movement  which  would  relieve  all  universal  pain,  that  is, 
j  poverty. 

***?  On  the  other  hand,  merely  relieving  humanity  of  the  pai 
of  poverty  is  only  the  first  step  toward  putting  it  in  a  posi- 
tion properly  to  enjoy  life.  The  man  with  the  injured  finger 
does  not  regard  it  as  the  end  of  life  simply  to  be  relieved 
of  pain.  The  end  of  life  is  to  experience  happiness,  a  positive, 
not  merely  a  negative  condition;  and  man's  greatest  enjoy- 
ment lies  in  the  exercising  of  his  functions, — first  of  the 
physical,  then  of  the  intellectual  and  the  spiritual.  With 
poverty  abolished  from  the  earth,  men  will  be  relieved  of  the 
necessity  of  attending  to  their  material  needs — or,  at  least, 
such  attention  will  be  inconsequential — and  will  devote  them- 
selves to  living  their  spiritual  lives. 

Keligion,  therefore,  in  its  broader  and  higher  sense  is  this 
relating  of  man  to  the  universe,  and  Socialism  is  the  path  to 
this  great  end.  Our  poets  and  artists  are  simply  men  who 
best  experience  an  emotional  contact  with  all  humanity,  and 
wfeo  pan  give  to  their  emotions  a  visible  form,  in  their  poems 


Socialism:  A  Keligion  303 

and  statues,  that  all  may  see  and  enjoy.  When  Socialism 
comes,  men  will  not  only  feel  happy  individually,  but  will  also 
be  conscious  of  their  perfect  relation  to  a  happy  humanity,  and 
that  humanity,  as  a  whole,  will  feel  its  relation  to  each  indi- 
vidual. Then  all  men  will  be  poets  and  artists,  and  then, 
indeed,  will  come  the  birth  of  the  Superman. 

The  greatest  inspiration,  therefore,  that  can  come  to  the 
spirit  of  man  is  that  he  realize  himself  at  one  with  the 
universe.  This  comes,  however,  only  when  men  are  as  per- 
fectly related  to  each  other  and  to  humanity  as  the  cells  in 
the  living  body  are  related  to  each  other  and  to  the  body  as 
a  whole.  Men  must  be  united  to  humanity  in  an  organiza- 
tion at  once  perfectly  democratic  and  perfectly  autocratic. 
With  this  advent  all  humanity  will  be  at  one  with  God,  and 
every  man  will  be  a  god.  Such  is  the  glorious  ideal  of  the 
Socialist,  an  ideal  that  inspires  him  with  a  religious  ecstasy 
to  which  no  emotion  that  has  hitherto  stirred  the  world  can 
compare. 


\  t 


304  Socialism  Inevitable 


THE  BOOM  OF  1906 

(July,  1906.) 

SOME  day,  and  a  not  very  distant  day  either,  people  will 
look  back  with  wonder  upon  the  "boom  of  1906."  We 
are  now  witnessing  the  greatest  period  of  insane  specu- 
lation that  this  American  nation  of  speculators  has  ever  ex- 
perienced ;  and  the  singular  part  of  it  is  that  notwithstanding 
all  we  should  have  learned  from  the  past  about  the  ephemeral 
character  of  such  booms  hardly  one  warning  voice  has  been 
raised,  while  the  big  financiers  and  bankers  who  should  be  the 
men  to  warn  us  of  an  impending  panic  are  the  very  ones  who 
are  pushing  along  the  boom  harder  than  any  other  class. 

What,  may  I  ask,  is  there  to  justify  all  this  construction 
of  new  houses,  stores,  factories,  and  railways  from  one  end 
of  the  country  to  the  other?  Certainly  not  the  increase  of 
population,  either  natural  or  from  immigration.  For  every 
American  born  and  for  every  foreign  immigrant,  we  are 
to-day  building  house-room  for  at  least  five. 

And  yet  only  two  years  ago  we  were  practically  facing  a 
commercial  depression,  a  condition  known  as  overproduction. 
We  then  had  apparently  too  many  houses,  railways  and  fac- 
tories. Does  any  one  mean  to  say  that  in  the  intervening  two 
years  population  has  so  increased  that  all  this  tremendous 
demand  for  goods  is  justified?  Of  course  not.  Then  if  two 
years  ago  we  could  not  use  up  what  we  were  producing  and 
if  conditions  to-day  are  practically  the  same,  how  is  it  that 
now  we  do  not  seem  able  to  produce  enough  for  consumption  ? 
Why  such  a  change? 

It  all  begun  from  the  demand  upon  us  to  supply  the  waste 
of  the  Japanese-Eussian  war.  From  that  demand  there  arose 
a  necessity  for  manufacturing  establishments,  while  at  the 
same  time  the  demand  for  our  farm  products  to  feed  the 
belligerents  caused  a  general  rise  in  food  stuffs. 

This  demand  for  the  building  of  factories  meant  an  in- 
creased demand  for  labor,  and  the  demand  for  labor  of  course 


The  Boom  of  1906  305 

meant  higher  wages.  Both  the  American  farmer  and  the 
American  laborer  have  had  more  money  to  spend  and  they  have 
spent  it.  Goods  of  all  kinds  as  a  consequence  have  been  in 
demand.  More  shoes  were  wanted,  more  theatres  were  patron- 
ized, more  luxuries  were  bought,  all  of  which  has  meant  a 
demand  for  more  factories. 

Now  each  factory  that  has  been  built  calls  for  still  other 
factories  and  industries  to  furnish  the  machinery  to  build  the 
first.  When  a  new  factory  is  built  it  creates  a  demand  for 
lumber;  this  may  mean  the  building  of  a  new  railroad  into 
a  new  lumber  camp  to  haul  out  the  lumber,  which  in  turn 
may  mean  the  building  of  a  new  steel  rail  mill  to  make  more 
rail.  The  building  of  the  rail  mill  may  mean  the  opening  of  a 
new  iron  mine  which  may  require  still  another  new  railway  to 
haul  the  ore,  new  steamships  to  carry  the  ore  on  the  lakes, 
and  new  piers  for  the  steamers.  Furthermore,  new  steamers 
need  paint,  more  paint  means  more  lead  and  zinc  mines  must 
be  opened,  etc.,  etc. 

And  all  these  new  enterprises  mean  a  greater  demand  for 
labor,  still  higher  wages,  more  demand  for  farm  products 
and  inflated  prices  all  along  the  line  for  all  commodities. 

At  first  the  demand  caused  by  the  Japanese  war  was  met  by 
our  selling  goods  and  farm  products  at  the  normal  price 
prevailing  two  years  ago;  then,  as  the  demand  increased 
prices  naturally  rose  and  traders  and  manufacturers  made 
more  and  more  profits.  Then,  as  prices  of  secondary  com- 
modities needed  in  the  production  of  the  primary  products  also 
rose,  profits  fell  off  and  a  further  rise  in  the  price  of  primary 
goods  took  place  to  restore  profits  to  the  original  status.  For 
instance,  first  the  price  of  steel  advanced,  then  the  price  of 
iron  ore  went  up,  then  the  price  of  steel  again  advanced  on 
account  of  the  higher  price  of  ore. 

Labor  likewise  remained  for  a  time  at  the  old  level,  but 
the  increased  demand  and  especially  the  increased  cost  of 
living,  caused  it  finally  to  rise  along  with  the  other  com- 
modities, although  by  no  means  in  proportion  to  the  general 
cost  of  living.  This  means  that  labor  is  really  not  consuming 
any  more  than  it  did  before  the  boom,  because  the  higher 
wages  it  now  gets  do  not  give  it  any  more  real  purchasing 
power.  As  a  matter  of  fact  the  largely  increased  production 
is  altogether  absorbed  by  the  increased  investments  of  the 


306  Socialism  Inevitable 

capitalists  in  new  machinery  of  consumption,  new  railways, 
etc. 

Now  the  starting  point  for  all  this  boom,  as  has  been 
shown,  was  the  Japanese  war,  and  we  are  still  running  on  the 
start  that  it  afforded  us.  So  that  unless  another  war  comes 
along  to  give  us  another  boost  our  boom  is  as  sure  to  soon 
stop  short  as  a  clock  is  to  run  down  unless  some  one  re-winds 
it.  There  is  no  more  possibility  of  perpetual  motion  in  con- 
nection with  the  present  system  than  there  is  with  an  eight- 
day  clock.  The  problem  with  us  Americans  is  what  to  do 
when  our  industrial  clock  runs  down  and  stops. 

As  I  write  these  lines,  the  first  of  July,  1906,  while  prices 
are  booming  as  never  before,  while  there  has  never  been  such 
building  activity,  while  the  banks  and  the  United  States 
treasury  were  never  so  flooded  with  money,  while  corpora- 
tion dividends  were  never  so  great,  while  there  is  an  un- 
precedented boom  in  real  estate  throughout  the  whole 
American  continent, — for  Canada,  too,  is  with  the  United 
States  in  the  same  mad  race, — I  say  with  all  these  favorable 
conditions  in  trade,  and  without  a  cloud  upon  the  financial 
sky,  it  seems  madness  to  predict  that  within  a  twelve-month 
all  will  be  reversed  and  the  country  will  be  in  a  state  of  panic, 
and  yet  I  give  the  present  boom  just  one  year  to  reach  its 
zenith  and  collapse. 

I  predict  also  that  when  the  collapse  does  come  it  will  have 
an  infinitely  greater  social  effect  than  any  other  previous 
crisis.  We  are  about  to  plunge  suddenly  from  the  present 
condition  of  unbounded  prosperity  to  unprecedented  depres- 
sion. Merchants  and  manufacturers  who  to-day  hardly  know 
what  to  do  with  their  enormous  profits  will  then  be  terrified 
to  know  how  to  avoid  bankruptcy.  Workingmen  who  are  now 
scorning  the  highest  wages  ever  paid  in  the  history  of  the 
country  will  then  be  cringing  at  soup  kitchens,  glad  to  be  fed 
by  charity.  The  trade  unions  will  be  wrecks.  The  Socialist 
Party  and  the  Socialist  press  alone  will  be  booming. 

Now,  we  have  had  other  such  crises  in  this  country  when 
times  have  been  as  hard  as  those  I  have  just  predicted  will 
shortly  came  upon  us,  but  in  the  past  the  people  generally,  and 
labor  in  particular,  looked  upon  such  a  crisis  as  an  unavoidable 
natural  event.  Men  regarded  times  then  as  they  regarded 
yellow  fever  two  years  ago  in  New  Orleans  before  the  infection 


The  Boom  of  1906  307 

was  found  to  lie  in  the  bite  of  a  mosquito.  A  panic  and 
yellow  fever  were  alike  a  visitation  of  God  for  which  there 
was  little  or  nothing  to  be  done  but  to  sit  down  and  wait 
until  it  passed,  then  to  get  up,  bury  the  dead,  count  the 
survivors  and  await  its  reappearance. 

But  to-day,  when  yellow  fever  comes  to  New  Orleans,  in- 
stead of  sitting  down  and  doing  nothing,  they  busy  themselves 
in  getting  rid  of  the  mosquito-breeding  pools,  screening  the 
cisterns  where  mosquitoes  breed,  and  even  screening  their 
bed-rooms  as  an  extra  precaution. 

It  is  now  recognized  that  without  mosquitoes  yellow  fever 
cannot  be  transmitted.  The  mosquito  bites  a  person  infected 
with  fever,  then  bites  another  person  and  thus  conveys  the 
disease.  It  took  quite  a  little  time  to  educate  the  people  in 
New  Orleans  to  this  danger,  and  the  mosquito  theory  met 
with  all  kinds  of  ridicule,  but  the  last  epidemic  convinced  all 
classes  as  to  its  soundness. 

The  fear  of  death  is  a  great  schoolmaster  and  it  will  be 
the  fear  of  death  which  will  teach  the  American  people  in 
our  next  economic  crisis  the  scientific  method  to  avoid  starva- 
tion. 

We  will  at  last  see  that  the  mosquitoes  which  sap  our 
strength  and  poison  our  blood  are  the  capitalists.  We  will 
see  that  as  long  as  we  surfer  the  capitalist  mosquito  to 
puncture  our  veins  and  drain  our  blood  we  must  necessarily 
be  poverty-stricken.  We  will  see  that  it  is  impossible  to  get 
rid  of  the  capitalist  mosquito  as  long  as  we  allow  the  pools  and 
gutters  of  competition  and  private  ownership  of  capital  to 
remain.  So  we  will  set  to  work  and  drain  our  pools  as  did 
the  people  of  New  Orleans.  We  will  turn  to  and  fill  up  the 
capitalist  swamps  which  breed  our  capitalist  mosquitoes.  We 
will  open  up  the  mighty  river  of  Socialism,  a  great,  clearing, 
running  stream,  which  will  carry  man  upon  its  broad  bosom 
to  a  land  of  health  and  plenty. 

All  this  literature  of  exposure  which  is  now  going  on,  all 
the  muck-raking,  the  Beef  Trust  scandals,  the  life  insurance 
frauds,  the  railway  rebating,  all,  all  is  slowly  educating  the 
public  to  the  nature  of  our  present  system.  We  no  longer 
venerate  our  capitalist  leaders  any  more  than  the  Russians  of 
to-day  venerate  the  Tsar.  We  are  merely  waiting,  patiently, 
and  looking  for  an  opportunity  to  get  rid  of  them.    Just  now 


308  Socialism  Inevitable 

our  society  is  like  a  man  carrying  a  pack  through  the  Canadian 
forest  during  the  black  fly  season.  He  is  bitten  to  distraction  by 
the  flies,  but  he  cannot  stop  to  fight  them  on  account  of  the 
pack.  But  because  he  doesn't  brush  them  off  doesn't  mean 
that  he  doesn't  want  to  brush  them  off.  He  is  merely  biding 
his  time.  That  is  just  our  position.  We  are  too  busy  making 
money  and  drawing  wages  to  attend  to  our  capitalist  mosqui- 
toes. But  we  know  they  are  biting  us  all  right.  And  we 
know  they  are  of  no  more  benefit  to  us  than  are  the  black 
flies  to  the  man  carrying  the  pack.  We  know  they  are  annoy- 
ing pests,  but  we  don't  know  yet  that  they  are  as  deadly  as 
the  yellow  fever  mosquitoes.  New  Orleans  never  liked  the 
mosquito,  but  it  never  really  fought  them  until  it  found  them 
not  only  annoying  but  deadly. 

Let  the  next  crisis  come — and  my  prediction  is  that  it  will 
be  here  before  August,  1907,  unless  another  great  war  breaks 
out — and  we  will  see  the  American  people  do  some  much 
more  lively  mosquito  hunting  than  any  one  to-day  would 
think  possible. 

We  are  now  producing  wealth  in  unprecedented  quantity, 
and  no  one  can  deny  that  everyone  could  be  provided  for  in 
a  generous  manner.  At  the  same  time  we  are  diverting  an 
enormous  quantity  of  our  labor  force  to  the  building  of  more 
machinery  for  use  in  the  future.  We  are  building  a  two- 
hundred-million-dollar  canal  at  Panama,  a  new  hundred- 
million-dollar  steel  plant  at  Gary,  Indiana,  half  a  dozen  rail- 
way enterprises  are  going  on  and  each  costs  over  a  hundred 
million  dollars.  Millions  and  millions  are  going  into  new 
houses  and  factories.  If  one-quarter  of  the  capital  we  are 
now  putting  into  new  machinery  were  devoted  to  the  making 
of  more  goods  for  immediate  consumption  by  the  working 
class,  it  is  difficult  to  compute  how  great  would  be  the  ensuing 
good  and  comfort  to  the  recipients. 

In  addition  to  these  immense  "savings"  being  made,  our 
millionaires  are  wasting  millions  upon  millions  on  luxuries 
which  alone  is  evidence  that  we  are  producing  enough  and 
more  than  enough  for  all.  Unquestionably  we  have  right  now 
both  labor  and  capital  at  hand  sufficient  to  give  us  all  a  good 
living. 

But  suppose  in  a  year  from  to-day  there  is  a  crisis  coming 
and  instead  of  labor  and  capital  being  well  employed,  both 


The  Boom  of  1906  309 

are  idle.  Suppose,  instead  of  the  greater  part  of  the  working 
class  being  comparatively  well  clothed  and  well  fed,  the 
greater  part  of  them  are  hungry  and  out  of  work.  Does  any 
one  think  that  the  workers  will  have  memories  so  short  as  not 
to  be  able  to  look  back  one  short  year  and  contrast  their 
position  then  and  now  ?  Does  any  one  think  that  the  working 
class  in  their  present  frame  of  mind  are  going  to  submit  to 
starvation  for  any  considerable  time  and  be  calmed  by  the 
explanation  that  the  whole  trouble  is  "overproduction  ?"  It 
may  be  asked,  "What  are  they  going  to  do  about  it  ?"  I  can 
answer  right  now  what  they  are  going  to  do  about  it.  They 
are  going  to  demand  Socialism,  and  they  are  going  to  insist 
on  their  demand,  too. 

It  may  be  said  that  they  cannot  do  anything  without 
organization.  To  this  I  reply  that  the  germ  of  the  future 
organization  which  is  to  free  the  workers  is  already  at  hand, 
namely,  the  Socialist  Party.  It  is  true  that  to-day  it  is  of  com- 
paratively insignificant  size  and  strength,  but  this  is  merely 
because  conditions  have  been  unfavorable  to  its  growth,  viz., 
too  much  prosperity.  It  has  the  right  frame  work,  it  has  the 
right  principles,  it  is  headed  in  the  right  direction.  Let  the 
winds  of  an  economic  crisis  blow  and  the  country  will  be 
astonished  to  see  how  quickly  the  driftwood  in  the  labor 
stream  will  form  a  great  raft  which,  under  the  guidance  of 
the  Socialist  Party,  will  ferry  us  across  the  river  Styx  of 
capitalism  to  the  Elysian  Fields  of  Socialism. 


310  Socialism  Inevitable 


A  WILSHIRE  PROPHECY  OF  1889 

(April,    1907.) 

WHEN  I  first  began  to  talk  about  the  Trust  Problem, 
some  twenty  years  or  more  ago,  people  looked  upon 
me  as  a  crank.  I  would,  therefore,  be  glad  to  have 
my  readers  call  the  attention  of  scoffers  to  the  following  letter 
which  I  wrote  about  eighteen  years  ago.  Does  it  not  sound 
as  if  it  might  have  been  written  yesterday?  Can  any  other 
letter  upon  the  Trust,  giving  such  a  remarkably  true  forecast, 
be  found  outside  the  writings  of  Socialists  ?  If  so,  I  should 
like  to  see  it. 

(A  letter  published  in  the  Los  Angeles  Evening  Express,  Septem- 
ber 21,  1889.) 

A  TREATISE  ON  THE  TRUSTS. 

To  the  Editor,  Los  Angeles  Evening  Express: 

The  question  of  the  day  is,  "How  shall  Trusts  and  Monopo- 
lies be  exterminated?"  To  say  that  the  life  of  the  Kepublic 
hangs  on  this  issue  sounds  florid  and  rhetorical,  but  I  shall 
endeavor  to  justify  the  statement  by  a  few  observations. 

It  will  be  readily  admitted  that  inasmuch  as  every  man 
must  have  food  as  a  prime  necessity  that  if  one  man  gains 
control  of  our  food  supply  he  can  exact  all  the  wealth  of  the 
country  in  exchange  for  food.  He  would  have  far  more 
authority  over  the  life  and  property  of  the  American  people 
than  the  Czar  has  over  the  Eussians. 

For  another  illustration  of  the  power  of  monopoly,  suppose 
there  are  three  men  on  an  island,  and  that  one  at  one  end 
owns  the  only  supply  of  fresh  water,  one  at  the  other  end  the 
only  supply  of  food,  and  the  third  acts  as  a  common  carrier 
between  them,  and  has  an  absolute  control  of  the  only  road 
connecting  the  water  supply  with  the  food  supply.  It  can 
be  seen  that  the  carrier  might  easily  put  his  charges  up  to 
such  an  exorbitant  figure  that  he  would  soon  own  all  the  pos- 
sessions of  the  other  two  men.     Now  it  is  generally  admitted 


Wilshire  Prophecy  of  1889  311 

that  transcontinental  associations  of  railways,  pooling  ar- 
rangements, and  Mr.  Jay  Gould's  proposed  railroad  clearing 
house  are  but  the  precursors  of  some  form  of  combination  of 
the  different  lines  of  railways  in  this  country  under  one 
system. 

The  revelations  in  the  Senate  inquiry  in  Chicago  last  week 
as  to  the  operations  of  the  dressed-beef  association,  or  Beef 
Trust,  are  most  portentous.  It  was  shown  that  Mr.  Armour 
had  complete  control  of  the  business.  He  makes  men  sell  to 
him  at  his  price  or  crushes  them.  It  is  notable,  too,  that 
never  do  the  consumers  gain,  for  Mr.  Armour's  selling-price 
seems  to  have  no  relation  to  his  buying-price. 

The  Flour  Mill  Trust  in  the  Northwest  seems  to  be  almost 
as  well  organized  as  the  Beef  Trust,  the  price  of  flour  no  longer 
fluctuates  with  the  price  of  wheat. 

Petroleum  is,  as  every  one  knows,  an  article  whose  selling- 
price  is  fixed  by  the  Standard  Oil  Trust. 

I  will  not  extend  the  list  of  monopolized  commodities,  for 
I  might  include  coal,  thread,  needles,  in  fact  it  is  now  assum- 
able  that  when  an  article  is  a  manufactured  staple,  its  price 
is  pretty  sure  to  be  fixed  arbitrarily  by  some  trust  controlling 
its  production. 

One  may  say  that  we  are  very  nearly  arrived  at  the  condi- 
tion of  our  three  men  upon  the  suppositious  island  whose  food 
supply  was  controlled  by  one  man  who  owned  the  only  road. 

The  process  of  concentration  is  irresistible  and  inevitable. 
When,  for  instance,  one  great  Trust — say  the  Standard  Oil 
Trust — has  no  further  use  for  its  profits  in  further  extending 
its  plant,  when  it  is  completed,  it  will  naturally  look  for  in- 
vestment in  outside  businesses.  Knowing  from  its  own  ex- 
perience that  no  competitive  business  can  equal  a  Trust  for 
making  big  profits,  it  will  either  form  a  Trust  in  some  other 
process  of  production  or  it  will  buy  up  a  Trust  already  formed 
by  other  people. 

That  this  latter  process  of  concentration  is  now  going  on 
is  exemplified  by  the  buying  up  of  the  Cotton  Seed  Oil  Trust, 
and  very  recently,  the  White  Lead  Trust,  by  the  Kockefeller 
people.  It  is  the  big  fish  eating  the  little  fish,  the  survival 
of  the  fittest,  and  the  logical  end  must  be  that  every  industry 
in  this  country  will  finally  be  owned  and  controlled  by  one 
huge  Trust. 


312  Socialism  Inevitable 

Now,  I  do  not  pose  as  an  alarmist,  neither  am  I  waving 
the  red  flag,  but  I  do  wish  the  future  historian  to  say  when  he 
looks  over  the  moth-eaten  files  of  the  Los  Angeles  Evening 
Express  in  the  latter  days  of  the  Twentieth  Century,  that 
there  were  at  least  a  few  men  who  recognized  the  true  mean- 
ing of  the  growth  of  Trusts  in  the  United  States  in  the 
Nineteenth  Century. 

Faithfully  yours, 

Gaylord  Wilshibe. 


From  Chance  To  Certainty  313 


FROM  CHANCE  TO  CERTAINTY 

(September,   1907.) 

DESPITE  all  his  boasting  man  has  really  made  little 
or  no  progress  to  which  he  was  not  driven  by  neces- 
sity. To  do  anything  that  is  contrary  to  his  usual 
habits  requires  the  very  greatest  incentive ;  often  it  must  be  a 
question  of  life  itself  to  get  him  to  move.  It  is  well  known 
that  with  animals  even  starvation  will  not  make  them  change 
to  food  to  which  they  are  unaccustomed,  even  though  the  food 
is  equally  nutritious.  We  all  of  us  remember  how  difficult 
it  was  as  children  to  change  to  the  vegetables  and  meats  that 
were  spread  before  our  elders,  and  now,  after  we  have  acquired 
the  taste,  we  look  back  at  the  days  when  oysters  and  olives 
were  rejected  and  uneaten  as  time  lost  never  to  be  retrieved. 
It  is  not  so  long  ago  that  our  fathers  grew  both  potatoes  and 
tomatoes  purely  for  ornamental  purposes,  considering  them 
as  dangerous  as  toad-stools. 

It  would  hardly  be  rash  to  declare  that  man  has  only  learned 
of  the  delights  of  such  things  as  oysters,  olives  and  potatoes 
by  a  threat  of  starvation — did  he  not  dare  the  experiment — 
and  not  only  is  it  logical  to  assume  that  man  learned  of  the 
existence  of  other  edibles  than  roots,  berries  and  nuts  through 
the  stress  of  grim  necessity,  but  that  he  has  also  learned  new 
methods  of  getting  food  from  the  same  schoolmaster.  It  was 
a  great  step  forward  when  the  first  discoverer  communicated 
to  his  brother  man  that  there  was  milk  in  the  cocoanut,  but 
it  has  taken  many  thousand  years  for  man  to  come  to  the 
conclusion  that  cocoanuts  would  be  much  more  plentiful  if 
he  took  the  trouble  to  plant  them  rather  than  take  a  chance 
that  nature  would  do  it  for  him. 

However,  civilized  man  has  now  pretty  thoroughly  learned 
the  lesson  that  if  he  wants  to  be  sure  the  earth  shall  bear  him 
a  proper  food  supply,  the  only  safe  way  is  to  plant  the  seed 
himself  and  care  for  the  plant  until  the  fruit  is  safely  gath- 
ered.   Not  only  has  he  learned  not  to  trust  to  the  chance  of 


314  Socialism  Inevitable 

nature  doing  the  planting,  but  he  is  fast  losing  his  confidence 
in  her  ability  to  furnish  the  proper  supply  of  moisture  to 
make  the  planting  of  avail.  Artificial  irrrigation  is  yearly 
coming  to  be  more  relied  upon  by  man  to  secure  to  him  the 
result  of  his  labor  in  the  fields.  However,  does  any  one 
think  that  he  would  have  changed  the  happy-go-lucky  system 
of  getting  his  food  from  wild  animals  and  wild  plants  to 
grazing  and  agriculture,  if  grim  hunger  and  death  had  not 
been  the  angels  with  fiery  swords,  driving  him  from  his 
Edenic  garden  of  chance? 

The  whole  economic  history  of  the  race  might  be  summed 
up  in  saying  that  Necessity  has  driven  Man  from  chance  to 
certainty,  and  in  no  development  of  industry  is  this  same 
progress  more  clearly  seen  than  when  the  Trust  was  formed 
to  make  the  market  a  certainty  for  the  manufacturer,  when 
before  its  appearance  all  was  a  matter  of  chance.  The  To- 
bacco Trust,  for  instance,  not  only  knows  almost  to  an  ounce 
how  much  tobacco  it  can  with  safety  roll  into  cigarettes  with- 
out overstocking  the  market,  but  it  is  not  even  leaving  the 
question  of  distribution  to  the  chance  of  the  retailers  handling 
the  sales  properly,  for  it  is  rapidly  establishing  its  own  retail 
stores  in  every  large  city  in  the  country. 

But,  while  man  has  been  so  busy  in  lessening  the  element 
of  chance  in  the  production  of  what  he  wants,  he  has  been 
strangely  remiss  in  eliminating  the  chance  that  he  may  not 
get  it  after  he  has  produced  it.  Hitherto  he  has  gone  on  the 
theory  that  all  he  had  to  look  out  for  was  to  produce  enough, 
and  that  then,  by  some  benevolent  law  of  nature  he  would  be 
sure  of  getting  enough.  In  fact,  even  now  you  will  find  most 
men  believing  in  this  sufficiency  of  natural  law,  that  is,  that 
the  food  is  sure  to  find  its  way  into  the  hungry  man's  stomach, 
if  only  his  hands  have  succeeded  in  producing  enough  of  it. 
No  doubt  the  history  of  man  has  given  him  a  basis  for  belief 
in  such  a  theory,  as  no  one  ever  heard  of  savages  going  hungry 
when  there  was  food  within  reach,  any  more  than  one  could 
conceive  of  a  troop  of  monkeys  going  hungry  when  the  trees 
were  heavy  with  cocoanuts.  And  it  may  be  added  that  right 
up  to  the  time  when  man  began  to  use  machinery  in  the  pro- 
duction of  goods  he  never  went  hungry,  except  when,  as  a 
result  of  famine,  there  was  not  enough  to  go  around.  But  the 
moment  steam  was  discovered  man  began  to  make  goods  with 


From  Chance  To  Certainty  315 

one-tenth  of  the  labor,  and  in  one-tenth  of  the  time  that  he 
did  before,  and  from  that  moment  was  confronted  with  a  new 
problem,  one  that  he  never  thought  would  ever  be  presented  to 
him,  namely,  how  to  get  food  when  there  was  too  much  of 
it.  Overproduction  and  unemployment  were  once  meaning- 
less terms.  Man  first  began  by  taking  a  chance  that  he 
would  get  fed  by  nature,  and  when  this  did  not  always  work 
out,  he  took  systematically  to  directing  natural  forces  so  that 
he  was  sure  of  producing  the  food.  But  he  never  thought  of 
the  chance  arising  that  he  would  not  get  food  after  he  had 
produced  it.  And  it  was  not  unreasonable  for  him  to  think 
that  since  he  always  had  gotten  the  cocoanuts  when  nature 
chanced  to  produce  enough,  that  he  would  be  equally  sure  of 
getting  them  when  he  took  the  trouble  to  plant  a  cocoanut 
grove,  and  to  plant  it  by  the  seaside  where  the  trees  would 
get  both  the  salt  and  the  moisture  necessary  for  a  steady  yield. 

But  this  is  where  man  made  a  great  mistake.  He  has 
learned  the  lesson  that  he  must  not  take  a  chance  on  his 
Mother  Nature  giving  him  food,  but  has  yet  to  learn  that 
neither  must  he  take  a  chance  on  his  Brother  Man  giving  it 
to  him  when  Mother  Nature  has  done  her  part.  When  the 
cocoanut  grove  was  common  property  it  was  safe  enough  to 
count  on  getting  the  nuts  if  they  were  on  the  trees,  but  when 
he  gave  the  grove  to  his  Brother  Man  who  directed  the  plant- 
ing of  them,  he  found  that  he  had  another  bridge  to  cross 
before  he  could  be  sure  of  getting  his  share.  He  has  not 
taken  the  precaution  to  bind  the  owner  of  the  grove,  his 
newly-created  capitalist,  to  give  him  the  nuts.  In  other 
words,  he  took  chances  on  the  generosity  of  his  Brother  Man, 
and  he  has  been  fooled.  However,  he  has  not  been  fooled 
often  enough,  or  long  enough,  yet  for  him  to  see  that  the 
same  necessity  that  compelled  him  to  free  himself  from  con- 
trol of  his  Mother  Nature,  will  finally  force  him  to  free  him- 
self from  his  Brother  Man.  The  cocoanut  grove  must  not 
only  be  cultivated  by  man  co-operatively,  but  must  be  owned 
co-operatively,  if  man  is  to  be  sure  of  the  cocoanuts. 

Now  the  Socialist  says  that  the  earth  should  be  owned  by 
all  men,  and  that  the  fruits  thereof  should  be  the  joint  prop- 
erty of  all,  to  be  distributed  upon  a  basis  of  equity.  To-day 
the  cocoanut  groves  are  the  property  of  a  few  capitalists,  who 
only  distribute  nuts  to  the  people  when  they  need  their  labor 


316  Socialism  Inevitable 

to  cultivate  the  grove  or  to  plant  new  trees.  But  the  groves, 
which  have  been  planted  in  the  last  few  years,  are  now  rapidly 
coming  into  bearing,  hence  nuts  will  soon  be  so  plentiful  that 
there  will  be  no  demand  for  new  groves,  so  that  those  who  have 
been  getting  nuts  in  exchange  for  their  labor  in  the  planting 
of  more  groves  will  soon  be  told  that  their  services  are  no 
longer  needed,  as  there  are  already  too  many  nuts.  It  will  be 
useless  for  them  to  demand  nuts  when  the  capitalists  cannot 
use  their  labor,  and  then  they  will  see  what  fools  they  were 
to  neglect  their  future  interests  while  their  labor  was  in  de- 
mand. The  capitalists  do  not  give  nuts  away  because  they 
have  too  many,  they  give  nuts  in  exchange  for  labor  to  plant 
new  groves,  in  the  hope  that  the  increased  product  will 
make  them  so  much  the  richer.  The  richer  they  get  the  more 
groves  they  can  plant,  and  the  more  groves  they  can  plant 
the  richer  they  get.  To  get  rich  is  the  end  in  life  for  the 
capitalist. 

This  planting  of  more  and  more  cocoanut  trees  would  have 
gone  on  to  the  end  of  time,  until  the  whole  tropical  world 
would  have  become  a  vast  cocoanut  grove,  if  only  we  could 
have  eaten  all  the  cocoanuts  produced;  but  when  the  new 
groves  had  commenced  to  bear  more  nuts  than  we  could  eat, 
the  capitalist  owners  would  have  cried  out,  "over-production," 
and  stopped  giving  nuts  as  payment  for  the  planting  of  more 
groves.  This  would  be  a  very  natural  proceeding  on  their 
part,  for  why  should  they  give  nuts  for  the  planting  of  new 
groves  when  it  was  most  obvious  that  the  present  groves  were 
already  producing  far  more  nuts  than  could  be  eaten? 

But  while  it  was  natural  enough  for  the  capitalists  not 
to  wish  new  groves,  which  would  produce  nuts  that  could 
not  be  used,  it  was  equally  natural  for  labor,  which  had 
hitherto  been  accustomed  to  get  its  nuts  for  the  planting  of 
the  said  groves,  to  raise  a  very  strenuous  howl  when  it  found 
that  its  nut  supply  was  suddenly  shut  off  by  "over-production." 

Now,  if  we  can  for  a  moment  substitute  some  other  commod- 
ity, say  any  well-known  staple  in  the  market,  in  place  of 
cocoanuts,  and  consider  the  workers  engaged  in  the  produc- 
tion of  that  commodity,  we  may  not  have  much  difficulty  in 
seeing  what  a  complete  parallel  may  be  drawn  between  the 
imaginary  primitive  cocoanut  industry  and  the  real  world 
industrial  process  of  to-day.    For  instance,  if  you  will  look 


From  Chance  To  Certainty  317 

at  your  daily  paper  you  will  see  that  there  has  been  a  great 
break  in  the  price  of  copper.  Why  ?  Merely  because  copper  is 
being  produced  faster  than  the  market  can  absorb  it.  This 
slump,  of  course,  will  result  in  greatly  reduced  profits  in 
copper  mines  which  will  mean  that  less  men  will  be  employed 
in  mining  copper,  and  that  there  will  be  less  wages  to  buy 
things  with.  Now  among  the  things  that  will  be  less  in  de- 
mand will  be  copper  itself  because  at  the  beginning  of  our 
vicious  circle  copper  was  in  less  demand,  therefore  it  ends  by 
being  still  in  less  demand.  Now  is  this  not  exactly  what  is 
happening  to-day  in  our  business  world  ?  Is  there  much  diffi- 
culty in  substituting  copper  for  cocoanuts  and  understanding 
the  story  of  the  cocoanut  grove?  Is  it  not  obvious  that  if 
men  wish  to  be  sure  of  getting  copper  after  they  have  pro- 
duced it,  that  it  is  just  as  necessary  for  them  to  own  and 
operate  their  own  copper  mines  as  it  is  for  them  to  own  the 
trees  and  pick  their  own  cocoanuts  ? 

I  have  put  myself  on  record  as  predicting  that  the  com- 
mercial world  was  about  to  enter  into  a  period  of  overproduc- 
tion and  unemployment.  The  capitalists  have  been  unusually 
prosperous  for  the  past  few  years,  planting  out  new  cocoanut 
groves — opening  up  new  copper  mines — but  we  are  now  about 
to  be  told  that  the  world  has  too  many  cocoanuts — in  other 
words,  too  much  copper,  too  much  iron,  too  much  of  every- 
things,  and  that,  therefore,  there  is  no  demand  for  labor  to 
produce  anything. 

If  we  owned  our  own  cocoanut  groves  we  would  simply  let 
the  cocoanuts  grow  and  put  only  enough  labor  in  the  planting 
of  new  groves  to  keep  up  the  necessary  supply.  If  we  happened 
to  have  so  many  nuts  that  we  could  not  eat  them  all,  instead 
of  being  worried  lest  we  starve  to  death  we  would  merely 
feel  relieved  to  know  that  a  certain  amount  of  labor  in  the 
planting  of  new  groves  need  no  longer  be  diverted  to  that 
purpose.  This  would  mean  so  much  the  more  leisure  for  all, 
so  much  more  leisure  for  man  to  devote  to  the  cultivation  of 
his  soul  rather  than  to  the  cultivation  of  cocoanut  trees. 

However,  we  fear  that  even  such  a  great  end  as  the  gaining 
of  leisure  to  cultivate  the  soul,  so  as  to  give  man  that  indi- 
vidual and  social  culture  which  will  put  him  into  emotional 
contact  with  all  the  universe,  we  say  that  even  the  gaining  of 
such  a  great  end  as  this  will  never  move  him  to  action.    What 


318  Socialism  Inevitable 

will  finally  make  him  move  will  be  the  realization  that  his 
miserable  body  will  perish  unless  he  changes  his  social  system, 
and  incidentally  in  the  saving  of  his  body  he  will  save  his 
soul — he  will  do  so  because  he  must. 

All  of  this  goes  to  prove  that  Socialism,  while  ostensibly 
a  materialistic  philosophy,  is  basically  spiritual.  The  Socialist 
says,  save  the  body  and  the  soul  will  save  itself. 


Significance  of  the  Trust  319 


THE  SIGNIFICANCE  OF  THE  TRUST 

(July,  1902.) 

THE  real  danger  of  the  Trust  exists  not  in  what  it  is 
to-day,  but  in  what  it  promises  for  to-morrow.  Most 
writers,  unfortunately,  have  confined  themselves  too 
much  to  the  most  palpable  features  of  the  Trust.  Anyone 
can  see  the  menace  to  our  institutions  involved  in  the  change 
from  industry  conducted  on  a  competitive  democratic  basis 
to  a  monopolistic  autocratic  one,  and  the  menace  to  labor  is 
equally  apparent  if  there  be  but  one  employer  instead  of  ,a 
hundred.  Anyone,  moreover,  can  see,  when  the  production 
of  a  commodity  is  controlled  by  a  Trust,  that  prices  may  be  put 
up  to  exorbitant  figures.  All  these  points  are  so  obvious  that 
it  seems  almost  unnecessary  to  call  attention  to  them. 

And  not  only  is  time  wasted  in  expatiating  upon  these 
manifest  dangers  of  the  Trust;  but  the  remedies  suggested 
are  usually  so  absurd  that  merely  to  outline  them  would  ex- 
haust the  readers'  patience.  It  is  the  indication  of  what  is 
to  come  wherein  lies  its  most  dangerous  significance,  for  the  * 
Trust  signifies  the  near  approach  of  a  tremendous  unemployed 
problem. 

A  great  change  in  public  opinion  regarding  this  issue  hast 
occurred  in  the  last  few  years.  It  is  not  so  very  long  since 
all  our  public  men  and  newspapers  had  but  one  solution  for 
the  problem.  "The  Trust  must  be  destroyed,"  they  said. 
To-day  nobody  in  his  senses  looks  to  such  a  possibility,  for 
the  trusts  are  now  admitted  to  be  the  natural  and  inevitable 
result  of  our  competitive  economic  system. 

I  do  not  propose  dwelling  at  any  length  upon  the  inevitabil- 
ity of  the  Trust,  therefore,  as  I  regard  the  task  as  practically 
superfluous.  The  point  I  care  more  to  emphasize  is  the 
impossibility,  in  an  economic  sense,  of  the  permanence  of  the 
Trust.  Let  me  say  at  once,  however,  before  I  raise  false  hopes 
in  the  breast  of  the  classical  economist,  that  I  do  not  propose 
to  show  that  the  Trust  must  fall  to  pieces  of  its  own  weight, 


II 


320  Socialism  Inevitable 

and  that  competition  will  finally  be  restored,  owing  to  the 
entrance  of  fresh  capital.  That  would  be  an  extremely  foolish 
position  to  take  after  having  asserted  the  inevitability  and 
necessity  of  the  Trust. 

Neither  am  I  attempting  a  glittering  paradox  by  first 
asserting  the  Trust's  inevitability,  and  in  the  next  breath 
declaring  it  ephemeral.  The  theory  which  I  shall  endeavor 
to  demonstrate  is  that  the  natural  and  inevitable  evolution 
of  our  industrial  system  is  from  competition  under  private 
ownership  to  monopoly  under  private  ownership,  and  then 
from  monopoly  under  private  ownership  to  monopoly  under 
public  ownership.  In  declaring  the  impossibility  of  the  per- 
manence of  private  monopoly,  I  speak  simply  from  the  stand- 
point of  the  political  economist,  and  leave  out  of  consideration 
political  and  industrial  changes  which  may,  or  may  not,  result 
from  the  uprising  of  a  long-suffering  and  indignant  people. 
Public  ownership  of  industry  might  be  brought  about  next 
month  if  the  people  had  a  sufficient  desire  to  effect  it,  but 
it  is  with  the  "must  be"  I  shall  deal,  not  with  the  "might  be." 
I  shall  endeavor,  then,  to  prove  that  public  ownership — Social- 
ism— is  approaching,  not  merely  because  it  is  desirable,  but 
because  it  falls  into  the  category  of  inexorable  necessity.  My 
first  task  will  be  to  prove  the  necessity  of  the  Trust,  my  next 
to  prove  the  necessity  of  Socialism. 

The  Trust  had  its  origin  in  the  desire  of  the  manufacturers 
to  protect  themselves  from  overproduction,  and  the  consequent 
mad  and  suicidal  struggle  to  dispose  of  their  surplus  products. 
Overproduction  arises  because  our  productive  capacity  has 
been  developed  to  the  highest  degree  with  labor-saving  ma- 
chinery operated  by  steam  and  electricity,  while  our  consump- 
tive capacity  remains  stunted  by  the  competitive  wage  system 
which  limits  the  laborers — who  constitute  the  bulk  of  our 
consumers — to  the  mere  necessaries  of  life. 

I  will  not  tire  the  reader  with  weary  statistics  showing  the 
enormous  strides  that  have  taken  place  in  man's  productive 
capacity,  due  to  modern  machinery,  nor  will  I  harrow  his  soul 
with  the  well-worn  details  of  the  narrow,  sordid  life  of  squalor 
lived  by  our  workers.  It  is  patent  to  everyone  that  the  wage- 
worker  of  to-day  consumes  but  little,  if  any,  more  of  the 
necessaries  of  life  than  did  his  grandfather.  Consumption, 
per  capita,  of  beef,  flour,  potatoes,  coffee,  tobacco,  wool,  etc., 


Significance  of  the  Trust  321 

has  varied  but  slightly  in  the  last  fifty  years.  Every  student 
of  history  knows  in  a  general  way  that  the  ordinary  laborers 
of  this  country,  even  a  hundred  years  ago,  lived  in  a  fair 
degree  of  comfort,  were  warmly  clad  in  their  homespun,  and 
comfortably  housed  in  their  log  cabins.  The  best  proof  of 
this  is  their  remarkably  fine  physical  development,  their 
longevity,  and  their  freedom  from  disease.  The  average  family 
was  from  ten  to  fourteen,  for  neither  husband  nor  wife  had 
the  dread  of  an  addition  to  the  family  that  is  so  characteristic 
to-day.    Kace  suicide,  in  fact,  is  a  purely  modern  development. 

I  do  not  think  that  any  fair-minded  person  will  assert  that 
the  modern  day  laborer  on  his  $1.50  a  day,  and  very  uncertain 
of  that,  living  in  a  city,  wearing  shoddy  clothes,  breathing 
sewer  gas,  eating  tuberculous  beef,  drinking  typhoid  bacilli 
in  his  milk  and  fusel  oil  in  his  whiskey,  and  absorbing  intel- 
lectual garbage  from  his  yellow  journal,  has  had  any  great 
augmentation  in  the  pleasures  of  life  through  the  marvelous 
inventions  of  the  nineteenth  century. 

Labor  and  capital  are  jointly  producing  a  constantly  in- 
creasing quantity  of  wealth,  but  under  the  workings  of  the 
competitive  wage  system  the  workers  can  never  get  more  than 
merely  the  necessaries  of  life,  while  the  capitalists,  simply  by 
virtue  of  their  ownership  of  capital  must  get  the  whole  of 
the  remainder.  As  production  is  increased,  day  by  day, 
through  improved  methods,  the  share  of  the  capitalists  natur- 
ally increases  pro  rata  while  the  share  of  the  workers  remains 
as  it  was,  viz.,  the  bare  necessaries  of  life. 

Hence  the  workers,  as  a  class,  must  remain  in  poverty 
while  the  capitalists,  as  a  class,  must  get  richer  and  richer. 

A  huge  part  of  the  product  of  labor  falls  automatically  into 
the  lap  of  the  holders  of  wealth  in  the  form  of  rent,  with  no 
economic  obligation  on  their  part  to  render  any  service  in 
return.  Witness  the  enormous  incomes  of  the  Duchess  of 
Marlborough  and  the  Countess  Castellane,  representing  the 
Vanderbilt  and  Gould  wealth  in  Europe,  and  discover,  if  you 
can,  any  return  that  they  render  to  the  American  people.  It 
is  possible  that  someone  might  so  strain  his  imagination  as 
to  believe  that  the  Astors,  the  Eockefellers,  and  the  Vander- 
bilts,  who,  among  them,  have  an  income  in  the  neighborhood 
of  one  thousand  million  a  year,  perform  some  economic  good 
in  return,  but  I  doubt  if  their  most  generous  retainer  would 


322  Significance  of  the  Trust 

assert  that  a  hundred  thousand  dollars  a  year,  each,  would 
not  be  sufficient  compensation,  considering  the  fact  that  our 
college  professors  receive,  on  an  average,  less  than  one  thou- 
sand dollars. 

The  stream  of  wealth  flowing  into  the  coffers  of  the  rich 
is  itself  subdivided  into  two  streams,  one  of  which  goes  to 
satisfy  what  they  are  pleased  to  regard  as  their  necessities 
of  existence,  a  wonderful  conglomeration  of  beef -steaks,  truf- 
fles, champagne,  automobiles,  'private  cars,  steam  yachts, 
polo  ponies,  golf  outfits,  picture  galleries,  food  and  clothing 
for  their  servants,  etc.,  all  classified  under  the  general  head 
of  consumables,  and  paid  for  by  "spent"  money. 

The  other  division  of  the  stream  is  what  is  termed  "saved" 
money,  and  flows  into  the  building  of  new  machinery  of  pro- 
duction, new  railroads,  canals,  iron  furnaces,  mills,  etc. 
And  it  is  this  channel  of  "saved,"  or  invested,  money  that  has 
provided  the  main  outlet  for  the  surplus  product  income  of 
the  rich  and  thereby  prevented  a  plethora  in  our  industrial 
system. 

Notwithstanding  the  fact  that  the  prodigality  of  the  Ameri- 
can rich  is  the  wonder  of  the  age,  their  number  is  so  small 
proportionately,  that  all  their  efforts  in  lavish  "spending" 
have  had  little  economic  effect  compared  to  the  wealth  they 
are  forced  to  "save,"  owing  to  their  lack  of  ingenuity  in  de- 
vising new  modes  for  "spending."  There  is,  therefore,  a 
grim  satisfaction  in  the  reflection  that  the  saving  capacity  of 
the  nation  is  increased  by  the  concentration  of  wealth  in  the 
Eockefeller  and  Vanderbilt  families.  Thrift  is  no  longer  such 
a  difficult  virtue  when  it  requires  more  labor  to  spend  than  it 
does  to  save,  and  this  is  the  predicament  of  the  very  rich 
Americans. 

No  man  cares  for  two  dinners,  and  when  Mr.  Eockefeller 
with  his  hundred  million  a  year  spends  more  than  a  thousand 
dollars  a  day  on  himself  and  his  household,  he  finds  it  both 
pleasanter  and  easier  to  "save"  the  remainder  of  his  income 
than  to  lie  awake  nights  devising  bizarre  ways  of  spending  it 
or  even  disposing  of  it  to  colleges  or  libraries.  However,  as 
conditions  exist  at  present  in  the  business  world,  it  must  be 
admitted  that  it  is  about  as  difficult  for  him  to  discover  new 
openings  in  which  to  invest  his  savings  as  it  is  to  invent  ways 


Socialism  Inevitable  323 

to  spend  it.  I  pity  him.  What  use  is  money  if  you  can  neither 
spend  it  joyfully  nor  invest  it  profitably  ? 

Years  ago  when  Eockefeller  first  went  into  the  business  of 
refining  oil,  he  was  not  bothered  with  the  problem  of  invest- 
ing his  profits,  first,  because  they  were  not  so  large  as  to  be 
cumbersome;  and,  secondly,  because  the  oil  business  itself, 
notwithstanding  sharp  competition,  was  a  fairly  profitable  one 
and  it  gave  ample  scope  for  the  re-investment  of  his  earnings. 
His  competitors,  however,  also  re-invested  their  earnings  in 
the  oil  business,  until  the  capacity  for  refining  oil  finally 
became  greater  than  the  market  demanded.  Each  refiner  was 
then  bound  to  get  rid  of  his  surplus  product  as  best  he  could, 
and  as  the  price  of  the  surplus  determined  that  of  the  whole 
prices  consequently  sank  to  such  a  ruinously  low  figure  that 
bankruptcy  stared  them  in  the  face.  Overproduction  simply 
had  to  be  curtailed,  combination  was  the  only  remedy,  and 
thus  the  Standard  Oil  Trust  was  born. 

All  this  has  been  brought  out  time  and  again  in  the  many 
Federal  and  State  inquiries  into  the  affairs  of  this  Trust,  and 
in  the  Congressional  investigation  of  1888  Eockefeller  com- 
pletely proved  that  competition  was  ruining  his  business,  and 
that  combination  had  become  an  absolute  necessity.  His 
testimony,  furthermore,  has  never  been  seriously  questioned; 
but  politicians  saw  the  chance  to  make  political  capital  out  of 
it,  and  without  attempting  to  controvert  his  statements,  began 
to  urge  the  destruction  of  the  Oil  Trust.  However,  notwith- 
standing all  their  efforts  to  overturn  the  laws  of  nature  and 
make  water  run  up  hill,  Eockefeller  persisted  in  combining 
and  making  money  instead  of  losing  it  by  following  their 
plan  of  competition. 

Capital,  like  water,  seeks  its  own  level.  When  no  Trust  is 
on  guard  to  intimidate  would-be  investors,  abnormally  large 
profits  will  induce  the  flow  of  fresh  capital  into  any  business 
until  normal  conditions  have  been  reached.  Hence,  as  may 
be  inferred,  if  capital  was  invested  in  oil  refineries,  notwith- 
standing the  unpromising  outlook,  it  was  an  indication  that 
other  businesses  were  in  the  same  state  of  plethora,  and  could 
offer  no  better  inducements.  That  this  was  actually  the  case 
has  been  fully  substantiated  by  the  subsequent  formation  of 
trusts  in  many  other  lines  of  manufacture,  to  prevent  the 


324  Socialism  Inevitable 

same  plethora  of  capital  that  had  been  a^ecting  the  oil  busi- 
ness. 

The  great  industrial  undertakings  of  the  world,  so  far  as 
present  developments  would  indicate,  are  practically  finished. 
As  the  late  David  A.  Wells  says  in  his  Recent  Economic 
Changes:  "It  would  seem  indeed  as  if  the  world  during  all 
the  years  since  the  inception  of  civilization  has  been  working 
upon  the  line  of  equipment  for  industrial  effort — inventing 
and  perfecting  tools  and  machinery,  building  workshops  and 
factories,  and  devising  instrumentalities  for  the  easy  commu- 
nication of  persons  and  thoughts ;  that  this  equipment  having 
at  last  been  made  ready,  the  work  of  using  it  has,  for  the  first 
time  in  our  day  and  generation,  fairly  begun;  and  also  that 
every  community  under  prior  or  existing  conditions  of  use  and 
consumption,  is  becoming  saturated,  as  it  were,  with  its  re- 
sults." 

There  is  certainly  no  country  in  which  the  industrial 
machinery  is  so  overbuilt  as  in  the  United  States.  We  are 
saturated  with  capital,  and  can  absorb  no  more.  Under  normal 
conditions  the  output  of  the  machinery  of  production  in  three 
days  is  more  than  we  can  consume  in  a  week,  and  the  present 
boom  is  recognized  by  all  to  be  of  the  most  ephemeral  nature. 

Now  as  a  general  law  in  economics  it  may  be  stated  that  the 
tendency  to  combination  increases  both  with  the  increased 
capital  in  each  competing  plant,  and  with  the  decrease  of  the 
actual  competitors.  In  1890  there  were  910  establishments 
manufacturing  agricultural  implements,  with  a  capital  of 
145  millions.  In  1900  we  have  but  715  establishments,  al- 
though the  total  capitalization  has  increased  to  157  millions. 
In  establishments  manufacturing  salt,  the  number  has  de- 
creased during  the  past  ten  census  years  from  200  to  159, 
while  the  capitalization  has  increased  more  than  100  per  cent., 
or  from  thirteen  to  twenty-seven  millions.  Slaughtering 
establishments,  likewise,  have  decreased  in  number  from  1,118 
to  921,  while  their  total  capitalization  has  increased  from 
116  to  189  millions.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  all  three  of  these 
industries  are  in  the  hands  of  a  Trust,  but  the  capitalists  so 
juggle  their  reports  that  the  census  reports  fail  to  show  the 
truth. 

Perhaps  the  most  striking  returns,  however,  are  those  of  the 
carriage  and  wagon  factories,  which  have  decreased  in  number 


Significance  of  the  Trust  325 

from  8,614  to  7,632,  while  their  capitalization  has  increased 
from  104  to  118  millions.  And  the  most  note-worthy  fact  is 
that  the  number  of  wage-earners  has  decreased  from  64,259 
to  62,540,  while  the  "salaried"  employees — clerks,  salesmen, 
etc., — are  now  actually  fifty  per  cent,  less  than  in  1890,  or 
4,311  as  against  9,194.  The  cutting  off  of  "salaried"  em- 
ployees means  a  saving,  according  to  the  census,  of  $3,459,289 
a  year  to  the  carriage  makers. 

The  figures  from  the  flour  mills  also  show  the  same  trend 
toward  the  elimination  of  superfluous  employees.  The  total 
capital  invested  in  flour  milling  has  increased  in  the  last  ten 
years  from  208  to  218  millions,  but  the  number  of  wage- 
earners  has  decreased  from  47,403  to  37,073.  "Salaried" 
employees  have  been  reduced  from  16,078  to  5,790,  and  the 
millers  are  paying  out  $3,492,590  less  per  annum  for  salaries 
to-day  than  ten  years  ago. 

More  recent  statistics  still  show  the  same  tendency.  A  table 
compiled  by  the  well-known  statistician,  Mr.  Lucien  Sanial, 
shows  the  figures  pertaining  to  twenty-seven  typical  man- 
ufacturing industries  for  the  years  1880,  1900  and  1905.  In 
the  first  mentioned  year  the  number  of  these  establishments 
was  63,233.  Twenty  years  later  it  stood  at  51,912  and  five 
years  later  at  44,142.  This  shows  a  net  decrease  from  1900 
to  1905  of  15  per  cent.,  and  a  total  decrease  from  1880  of  35.3 
per  cent. 

In  1880  the  capital  invested  in  these  twenty-seven  indus- 
tries was  $1,276,600,000.  In  1900  it  had  risen  to  $3,324,- 
500,000  and  in  1905  to  $4,628,800,000,  an  increase  from 
1880  to  1905  of  262.6  per  cent. 

The  number  of  wage  workers  in  these  industries  in  1880 
was  1,080,200.  In  1900  it  was  1,611,000  and  in  1905,  1,731,- 
500.  This  shows  an  increase  from  1880  to  1905  of  but  60.2 
per  cent. 

A  second  table  takes  forty-seven  industries  all  of  which 
show  a  decrease  in  the  number  of  establishments  and  a  large 
increase  of  capital  from  1900  to  1905.  These  forty-seven  in- 
dustries comprised  29,800  establishments  in  1900;  five  years 
later  the  number  had  sunk  to  26,182.  In  1900  the  amount 
of  capital  invested  in  these  industries  was  $1,005,400,000,  and 
in  1905  it  had  increased  to  $1,339,500,000.    In  the  same  five 


326 


Socialism  Inevitable 


years  the  number  of  wage  workers  in  these  industries  had  only- 
increased  from  618,000  to  749,400. 

In  connection  with  the  above  figures  the  following,  showing 
the  utter  insignificance  of  the  small  producer  in  the  total  of 
manufacturing  industries,  is  well  worth  noting.  The  figures 
refer  to  1905. 

TABLE  OF  MANUFACTURING  ESTABLISHMENTS. 


CAPITALS 


Less  than  $5,000 

$5,000  to  $20,000 

$20,000  to  $100,000 

$100,000  to  $1,000,000  . 
Over  $1,000,000 


Num- 

Per 

ber 

cent. 

32.9 

71,162 

72,806 

33.7 

48,144 

22.2 

22,281 

10. 

1,882 

0.9 

TOTAL 
CAPITAL 

Per 
cent. 

1.8 

4.2 

13. 

43.8 

37.7 

Number 
wageworkere 

$165,300,000 
531,100,000 
1,655,800,000 
5,551,700,000 
4,782,300,000 

106,300 

419,600 

1,027,700 

2,537,550 

1,379,150 

Per 
cent. 


1.9 

7.7 
18.8 
46.4 
25.2 


It  will  be  seen  that  the  two  latter  classes  combined  aggre- 
gate 24,163  establishments,  or  only  11.2  of  the  total  number. 
But  they  have  $10,333,000,000,  or  81.5  of  the  total  manufac- 
turing capital,  and  employ  71.6  per  cent,  of  the  total  number 
of  wage  workers  in  manufacturing  industries.  It  may  be 
added,  also,  that  they  turn  out  79.3  of  the  total  product. 

But  the  volume  of  production  is  constantly  rising,  owing 
to  the  development  of  modern  machinery.  As  has  been  shown, 
there  are  but  two  outlets :  one  channel  carrying  off  the  product 
destined  to  be  consumed  by  the  workers,  the  other,  carrying 
all  that  remains  to  the  rich.  The  workers'  channel,  however, 
lies  between  the  rock-bound  banks  of  the  competitive  wage 
system,  for  wages  are  based  upon  the  cost  of  living,  not  upon 
the  efficiency  of  labor.  Thus  the  miner  in  the  rich  mine  gets 
the  same  wages  as  his  comrade  in  the  adjoining  poor  mine, 
and  the  owner,  not  the  laborer,  reaps  the  advantage. 

We  have  also  seen  that  the  channel  which  conveys  the  goods 
destined  to  supply  the  rich  is  subdivided  into  two  streams, 
one  of  which  empties  into  a  sea  of  luxuries,  while  the  other 
is  simply  an  overflow,  carrying  off  their  savings.  The  former 
may  broaden  somewhat  in  time,  but  owing  to  the  small  num- 
ber whose  wealth  permits  them  to  indulge  in  extravagant 
whims,  can  never  be  greatly  enlarged.  In  any  case,  the  pro- 
portion is  so  small  compared  to  the  channel  for  investment 


Significance  of  the  Trust  327 

that  it  affords  little  hope  for  relief  from  the  rising  flood.  In 
other  words,  the  rich  will  never  be  so  ingenious  as  to  spend 
enough  to  prevent  overproduction. 

The  great  overflow  channel,  which  hitherto  has  been  con- 
tinually widening  and  deepening  so  as  to  accommodate  the 
savings  of  the  rich,  is  now  suddenly  found  to  be  incapable 
of  further  enlargement,  and  even  in  danger  of  being  dammed 
up.  And  why  not?  Man's  wants,  speaking  materially,  are 
limited.  If  one  bridge  is  sufficient  to  carry  me  from  New 
York  to  Brooklyn,  a  second  would  be  a  surplus.  When  one 
car  line  is  built  on  a  street,  there  is  no  room  or  necessity  for 
more. 

It  is  almost  superfluous  to  point  out  that  with  wages  deter- 
mined by  competition,  a  workingman  can  gratify  few,  if  any, 
of  his  spiritual  wants.  Indeed,  he  is  lucky  to  get  the  material 
necessities  of  life,  and  is  not  so  foolish  as  to  refuse  a  wage 
because  it  does  not  afford  luxuries,  while  another,  behind  him, 
is  only  too  willing  and  anxious  to  step  into  his  place. 

Let  us,  for  a  moment,  take  a  broad  view  of  the  United 
States  from  the  standpoint  of  the  man  with  a  million  dollars 
or  more,  who  seeks  a  safe  investment.  Would  he  care  to  build 
another  trans-continental  railway?  I  think  not:  there  are 
too  many  already.  Would  he  care  to  go  into  wheat  growing? 
Not  unless  he  is  in  need  of  a  guardian.  For  one  year  that  wheat 
pays,  there  are  apt  to  be  three  of  drought  or  overproduction; 
and  since  it  is  impossible  to  get  the  farmers  to  combine  to 
uphold  prices,  the  latter  situation  is,  at  present,  without 
remedy.  Could  he  find  one  single  industry  that  would  warrant 
the  investment  of  a  large  capital,  that  is,  an  industry  not 
palpably  overdone?  As  for  smaller  industries,  there  is  a 
consensus  of  opinion  in  the  business  world  that  there  are 
practically  none  promising  good  returns.  They  simply  manage 
to  exist,  like  the  mice  in  a  granary,  escaping  destruction  by 
reason  of  their  insignificance. 

The  channel  which  carries  the  surplus  wealth  for  the  up- 
building of  new  industries,  might  be  said  to  subdivide  itself 
into  a  many  branched  delta,  each  mouth  of  which  furnishes 
the  supply  for  a  particular  branch  of  trade.  Before  the 
oversupply  of  capital,  the  various  capitalists  exerted  every 
effort  to  widen  and  deepen  their  respective  channels;  but 
when  they  had  finally  procured  all  the  capital  they  wished, 


328  Socialism  Inevitable 

they  formed  their  Trust,  and  the  process  was  reversed.  It  was 
as  if  they  had  thrown  a  dam  across  the  entrance  to  their 
branch,  and  turned  the  water  back  into  the  main  stream  to 
be  distributed  through  the  other  mouths  of  the  delta, — that  is, 
into  the  other  industries. 

With  this  metaphor  before  one,  it  is  easy  to  see  that  as  the 
process  advances,  and  the  successive  mouths  are  closed  by 
successive  trusts,  so  much  the  greater  becomes  the  supply  for 
the  other  mouths,  and  so  much  the  more  imperative  the  need 
of  the  remaining  capitalists  to  erect  protective  dams.  For  as 
in  a  real  river,  so  with  our  industrial  stream,  when  a  sufficient 
number  of  mouths  are  dammed  up,  the  water  can  no  longer 
find  an  adequate  outlet,  and  has  a  strong  tendency  to  over- 
flow the  dams,  which  will  require  constant  strengthening  if 
they  are  to  remain  secure.  Each  new  Trust,  in  short,  is  a 
menace  to  the  security  of  all  previous  Trusts.  Finally  the 
Trusts  must  collapse  of  their  own  weight. 

Rockefeller,  with  his  enormous  income,  as  we  have  seen, 
cannot  find  room  for  his  investments  in  his  own  confessedly 
overdone  oil  business.  He  is  the  Alexander  the  Great  of  mod- 
ern industry,  sighing  for  more  worlds  to  conquer.  He  controls 
the  largest  banks,  and  has  already  taken  possession  of  the 
electric  light  and  gas  plants  of  New  York  City ;  he  is  in  con- 
trol of  the  iron  industry;  he  owns  the  Lake  Superior  mines 
and  the  lake  transportation  service,  and  will  soon  be  in  com- 
plete control  of  the  copper  mines  of  the  United  States  as 
well  as  of  our  entire  railway  system.  When  Rockefeller  gains 
control  of  an  industry,  the  temptation  for  outside  capital  to 
compete  with  him  is,  to  say  the  least,  not  overpowering. 

The  proofs  that  Trusts  are  necessarily  a  protection  against 
the  rising  flood  of  capital  are  simply  overwhelming,  both  in 
theory  and  in  fact,  and  it  is  clearly  apparent  that  every  in- 
dustry in  this  country  must,  in  time,  fall  into  their  power. 
But  the  question  is  not  merely  a  national  one.  The  Trust 
with  its  enormous  surplus  not  only  gives  our  capitalists  better 
facilities  for  competition  with  foreigners  in  foreign  neutral 
markets,  but  by  damming  up  the  old  and  natural  domestic 
channels  for  investment,  is  actually  forcing  them  to  invest 
in  foreign  countries. 

The  present  immense  flood  of  surplus  capital  in  the  United 
States  is  seen  in  the  Treasury  balance,  which  shows  the  great- 


Significance  of  the  Trust  329 

est  stock  of  gold  on  hand  ever  known  in  our  history.  The 
banks  are  overladen  with  money,  and  American  investors  are 
entering  into  the  world's  markets  as  buyers  of  foreign  bonds. 
Chauncey  Depew  says  that  we  are  annually  producing  two 
thousand  million  dollars  worth  of  goods  more  than  the  home 
market  can  absorb,  and  that  we  must  extend  our  foreign 
markets  if  we  wish  to  avoid  a  great  unemployed  problem. 
That  American  capitalists  fully  realize  this  is  shown  by  their 
aggressive  entry  into  foreign  manufacturing  fields. 

The  late  President  McKinley,  only  a  month  or  so  before 
death,  made  a  speech,  declaring  that  foreign  markets  must  be 
won  by  reciprocity  treaties,  and  that  this  was  absolutely 
essential  to  our  further  industrial  progress.  President  Koose- 
velt  also  declares  that  we  must  have  an  outlet  for  our  products 
abroad,  since  the  domestic  market  no  longer  suffices.  All  of 
which  is  exactly  in  line  with  my  argument,  as  to  premises, 
though  I  disagree  regarding  the  remedy. 

Foreign  trade  can  never  solve  the  problem  of  overproduc- 
tion. In  the  first  place,  most  of  the  goods  that  the  foreigner 
has  hitherto  given  us  in  return  for  our  domestic  productions 
can  now  be  made  both  cheaper  and  better  at  home  than 
abroad;  therefore  we  do  not  now  derive  the  same  advantage 
from  the  exchange  that  we  formerly  did.  There  was  a  day 
when  we  traded  our  wheat  for  English  steel  rail,  but  we  can 
now  make  steel  rail  cheaper  than  England.  Hence,  though 
we  still  have  our  wheat  to  sell,  we  no  longer  find  it  profitable 
to  take  steel  rail  in  exchange.  As  will  be  seen  from  the  fol- 
lowing extract  from  a  circular  issued  by  the  Silk  Association 
of  America,  the  United  States  is  no  longer  dependent  upon 
France  or  any  other  country  for  its  silk  goods,  and  hence 
another  important  item  of  foreign  exchange  is  about  to  lose 
its  power  as  a  purchasing  agent  of  our  products : 

"The  great  equipment  of  the  silk  mills  in  machinery  now, 
say  36,000  broad  looms  and  7,000  ribbon  looms  and  all  run 
by  power,  is  evidence  sufficient  that  the  domestic  silk  manu- 
factures are  fully  up  to  the  demand  of  the  consuming  markets 
of  the  United  States." 

In  short,  the  foreign  goods  that  can  he  profitably  imported 
into  our  country  are  becoming  narrowed  down  to  agricultural 
products  from  the  tropics,  and  it  is  evident  that  these  cannot 
possibly  offset  our  balance  of  exports.    Last  year  we  exported 


330  Socialism  Inevitable 

six  hundred  million  dollars  worth  of  commodities  in  excess 
of  our  importations,  and  after  allowing  for  the  money  spent 
by  American  tourists  abroad,  remittances  for  interest  on 
foreign  loans  and  the  freights  paid  foreigners  on  ocean  trans- 
portation, there  is  still,  apparently,  a  heavy  balance  in  our 
favor. 

Now  the  foreigner  may  go  into  debt  for  our  goods  for  a 
certain  period,  but  that  cannot,  on  the  face  of  things,  be  a 
permanent  method  of  trading.  Either  there  must  be  a 
settlement  some  day  or  trading  will  be  stopped  by  the  debtor 
going  bankrupt.  In  this  instance,  it  is  Europe  that  is  going 
bankrupt,  and  when  she  is  forced  to  confess  that  she  cannot 
pay  America,  then  America,  with  the  bankruptcy  of  her 
heaviest  customer,  will  not  be  far  from  bankruptcy  herself. 
We  will  not  take  goods  from  Europe  to  settle  our  trade  balance, 
and  she  cannot  give  us  gold.  How  then  can  foreign  trade  solve 
our  problem  of  overproduction  when  we  cannot  trade  ? 

Let  us  suppose  for  a  moment,  however,  that  our  manufac- 
turer, burdened  with  his  surplus  of  American  goods,  should, 
as  a  last  resort,  exchange  them  for,  say,  French  goods.  He 
has  now  on  the  docks  in  New  York  two  billion  dollars  worth 
of  French  goods  instead  of  two  billion  dollars  worth  of 
American  goods.  Will  anyone  tell  me  how  he  has  bettered 
himself,  and  how  he  is  going  to  get  rid  of  these  French  goods  ? 
Americans  either  will  not  or  cannot  buy  them.  The  rich, 
because  they  already  have  all  the  French  goods  they  want ;  the 
poor,  because  their  wages  do  not  permit  them.  Foreign  trade, 
clearly,  is  a  most  ephemeral  solution  for  the  problem  of  over- 
production. 

American  capitalists  to-day  are  more  in  need  of  foreign 
fields  for  investment  than  are  European  capitalists.  Within 
the  past  few  years  the  international  money  market  has  reversed 
itself,  and  America  is  now  the  creditor  instead  of  the  debtor 
nation.  The  trusts,  as  I  have  endeavored  to  show,  are  merely 
a  dam  built  to  prevent  the  swamping  of  our  industries  by 
the  rising  flood  of  surplus  capital,  just  as  the  tariff  is  a  dam 
to  prevent  them  from  being  swamped  by  foreign  capital. 
But  the  trusts  do  not  prevent  the  rising  of  the  flood.  It 
would  be  impossible  to  close  up  all  the  mouths  of  the  Missis- 
sippi no  matter  how  high  the  dams  might  be  built,  for  a 
flowing  river  must  eventually  reach  the  sea,  if  not  by  one 


Significance  of  the  Trust  331 

channel,  then  by  another.  And  the  trusts,  in  like  manner, 
will  prove  but  a  temporary  breastwork  for  our  captains  of 
industry. 

The  Trust,  on  the  other  hand,  is  not  only  a  protection 
against  undue  competition,  but  is  a  labor-saving  device  of 
the  highest  possible  efficacy.  It  substitutes  for  the  unscien- 
tific methods  of  competition,  a  sane  and  perfect  system.  Being 
the  only  producer  in  the  field  it  produces  exactly  what  the 
market  needs.  There  is  no  more  danger  of  either  an  over- 
supply  or  a  shortage  of  Standard  Oil  in  any  city,  than  there 
is  of  water,  gas,  or  postage  stamps,  and  like  these  com- 
modities, its  distribution  is  effected  without  the  services  of 
canvassers  or  the  wasteful  methods  of  advertising.  This 
increased  industrial  efficiency  of  the  Trust,  together  with  its 
prevention  of  waste  of  capital  in  unnecessary  duplication  of 
machinery,  hastens  by  so  much  the  completion  of  the  world's 
industrial  outfit.  It  will  not  be  long  before  capital  will  seek 
in  vain  for  profitable  investment.  Interest,  which  is  deter- 
mined by  the  amount  of  gain  received  by  the  last  amount 
borrowed,  will  fall  to  zero,  and  money  will  remain  unlent  in 
the  banker's  hands.  One  great  incentive,  that  of  interest  on 
deposits,  for  the  poor  man  to  put  his  money  in  a  savings 
bank  will  cease.  The  workers  now  engaged  in  producing  new 
machinery  of  production  will  be  thrown  into  the  ranks  of 
the  unemployed  army  by  thousands.  The  Trust  will  be  as 
powerless  to  meet  this  phase  of  our  industrial  collapse  as 
was  the  armored  knight  of  old  to  meet  hunger  and  thirst. 

Political  autocracy  is  possible,  but  industrial  autocracy, 
no  matter  how  benevolent,  is  economically  impossible.  At 
present,  the  Trust  is  an  invaluable  and  absolutely  necessary 
weapon  of  defence  for  the  capitalist  in  our  industrial  war- 
fare, but  when  the  enemy  to  be  fought  is  no  longer  competing 
capital,  but  a  complete  cessation  of  demand  for  the  goods 
produced,  its  value  will  have  passed. 

On  board  ship,  in  mid-ocean,  if  I  control  the  water  supply 
I  can  demand  what  I  like  for  this  indispensable  necessity; 
but  when  I  have  at  last  gathered  everything  into  my  posses- 
sion, my  monopoly  becomes  valueless,  since  there  is  nothing 
left  to  acquire.  If  I  am  wise,  I  will  then  peaceably  give  up 
control  of  the  water  to  the  crew,  and  may  consider  myself 
in  great  luck  if  they  do  not  get  the  fever  of  co-operation,  and 


332  Socialism  Inevitable 

come  back  after  me  for  the  good  things  they  yielded  me 
while  my  monopoly  existed. 

It  is  thus  in  the  United  States.  The  monopolists  have 
unwittingly  run  both  themselves  and  the  workers  into  an 
industrial  cul-de-sac.  The  capitalists  may  possibly  see  the 
danger  first,  and  make  a  turn  that  will  give  them  a  short  and 
precarious  lease  of  life  in  their  present  position.  An  eight- 
hour  law,  a  minimum  wage,  old  age  pensions,  and  such  re- 
forms, might  possibly  extend  the  capitalist  system. 

The  best  thing  of  all,  however,  to  bolster  up  the  old  regime 
would  be  a  rattling  good  war  between  the  great  powers.  If 
the  principal  industrial  plants,  railway  shops,  bridges,  etc., 
of  this  country  were  destroyed,  the  rebuilding  would  give 
unlimited  employment  to  labor  and  great  scope  to  capital 
for  the  investment  of  savings.  Witness  the  booms  which 
followed  our  Civil  War,  the  Spanish-American  War,  the 
British-Boer  War,  and  finally  the  war  between  Japan  and 
Russia. 

Wars,  however,  cannot  last  forever.  Sooner  or  later  the 
capitalists  will  be  forced  to  face  the  insoluble  problem  of 
finding  work  for  men  when  there  is  absolutely  no  work  to  be 
found.  It  is  absurd  to  hire  men  to  build  oil  refineries  when 
half  of  those  already  built  are  standing  idle,  and  the  work- 
man cannot  blame  the  capitalist  for  refusing  to  employ  him 
at  a  loss.  But  his  stomach  may  be  a  better  reasoner  than 
his  brain  in  this  emergency.  It  will  demand  food.  He  will 
say,  "Here  is  plenty  of  machinery  to  produce  food,  now  why 
is  it  I  can't  get  any?  You  say,  Mr.  Capitalist,  that  you 
can't  hire  me  at  a  profit.  That  may  be  so,  but  why  can't  I 
run  the  machinery  myself  and  take  the  product  to  feed  my 
family  ?  You  say  you  can't  run  it  at  present  except  at  a  loss. 
If  so,  then  you  will  lose  nothing  by  letting  me  have  it. 
Anyway,  I  don't  care  what  you  wish,  I  know  I  am  starving. 
You  admit  you  can't  give  me  food.  Now  I  know,  and  you 
know,  that  my  labor  will  produce  enough  to  feed  me  if  only 
I  have  your  machinery.  I  propose  to  take  it  and  use  it  for 
that  purpose.  I  am  going  to  elect  the  Socialist  Party.  I 
can  do  it,  for  I  can  cast  a  bigger  vote  than  you  can !  You  say, 
the  trouble  is  that  I  produce  too  much.  If  that  be  true,  then 
so  much  the  less  fear  of  my  starving  when  I  produce  for 
myself" 


Significance  op  the  Trust  333 

To  this  the  capitalist  may  reply :  "Why,  John,  you  can't 
run  a  flour  mill  all  alone;  it  takes  a  thousand  men.  You 
cannot  transport  that  flour  on  a  railway  by  yourself,  that 
requires  another  thousand  men  to  run  it.  You  need  associated 
labor.  Even  if  you  do  elect  your  Socialist  candidates  you 
will  be  forced  to  run  the  country  just  as  it  is  run  to-day." 
"Oh,  no/'  John  will  retort,  "We  will  run  the  flour  mill  and 
railways  co-operatively  by  a  public  corporation,  and  we  have 
that  corporation  already  formed.  It  is  the  United  States 
Government.  We  will  all  be  shareholders  and  we  will  pay 
the  workmen  upon  the  basis  of  what  they  produce  and  not 
by  a  competitive  wage  determined  by  how  little  they  can  live 
upon.  We  won't  have  any  overproduction  to  scare  us  then. 
When  we  nationalize  all  industry  that  bogey  man  of  over- 
production will  die  a  natural  death." 

Free  trade  is  sometimes  suggested  as  a  remedy  for  monopoly 
by  those  who  do  not  recognize  that  the  Trust  is  a  natural 
evolution  of  industry.  When  a  trust  in  a  protected  industry 
is  formed  to  prevent  destruction  of  that  industry  by  domestic 
competition,  and  then,  having  complete  control  of  the  domestic 
market,  it  raises  prices  abnormally,  the  public  are  inclined  to 
demand  a  reduction  in  the  tariff  so  as  to  allow  domestic 
consumers  the  benefits  of  foreign  competition.  Even  if  this 
were  done,  however,  it  would  accomplish  little  good,  for  it 
would  mean  either  that  the  foreigner  will  destroy  the  Trust 
by  his  ability  to  sell  at  a  lower  cost,  or  that  the  Trust  will 
destroy  foreign  competition  by  lowering  its  price.  And  even 
the  most  rabid  "Trust  Buster"  would  hardly  be  willing  to 
ruin  the  whole  industry  to  carry  out  his  er^ds. 

Most  of  the  trusts  in  this  country,  however,  are  abundantly 
able  to  take  care  of  themselves,  not  only  in  the  domestic 
market,  but,  as  the  export  returns  show,  throughout  the 
world,  so  that  the  tariff  to-day  is  of  no  use  to  the  Trust  ex- 
cept as  a  means  of  allowing  it  to  charge  higher  prices  to 
Americans  than  to  the  foreigner.  Free  trade  would  certainly 
abolish  this  unjust  absurdity,  but  it  would  fail  to  accomplish 
the  end  in  view,  viz.,  the  destruction  of  the  Trust.  Indeed 
the  very  fact  that  foreign  competition  had  to  be  met  would 
be  an  additional  reason  for  the  Trusf s  existence,  since  the 
concentration  of  capital  would  make  it  that  much  the  better 
fighting  machine.    Nevertheless,  the  protective  tariff,  so  far 


334  Socialism  Inevitable 

as  it  goes,  is  a  supporter  of  the  present  industrial  system, 
inasmuch  as  it  prevents  labor  and  capital  operating  at  the 
point  of  greatest  advantage,  and  gives  better  employment  to 
labor  exactly  as  inferior  machinery  requires  more  men  to 
operate  it. 

Some  have  suggested  that  equality  in  freight  rates  obtained 
by  the  government  ownership  of  railroads  would  destroy  the 
trusts.  The  slightest  investigation,  however,  would  show 
that  many  trusts  do  not  in  the  least  depend  upon  favors 
from  either  railroads  or  government.  The  taking  over  of  the 
railroads  by  the  government  would,  of  course,  have  far- 
reaching  and  revolutionary  results,  but  the  immense  labor- 
saving  that  would  occur  from  a  centralized  management  would 
but  serve  to  accentuate  the  unemployed  problem.  And  this 
would  be  the  least  of  its  effects. 

The  capital  invested  in  railroads  is  half  of  the  industrial 
capital  of  the  United  States.  A  transfer  of  ownership  to  the 
State  would  mean  the  payment  to  the  present  railway  owners 
of  an  enormous  sum  of  money  that  would  naturally  seek 
investment  in  other  industries.  These  industries,  owing  to 
the  plethora  of  capital,  are  already  at  the  point  of  crystallizing 
into  monopolies,  and  the  advent  of  such  an  unprecedented 
flood  of  money  would  not  only  complete  the  process,  but 
would  cause  the  amalgamation  of  all  the  trusts  into  one  huge 
organization,  the  coming  Trust  of  Trusts.  Nationalization 
of  the  railways,  in  short,  would  be  letting  free  such  a  flood  of 
capital  that  the  ship  of  state  would  be  immediately  floated 
into  the  calm  sea  of  Socialism. 

During  the  last  twelve  months,  nearly  $50,000,000  has  been 
paid  in  dividends  by  the  Standard  Oil  Trust.  It  may  be  noted 
that  the  investing  public  pay  no  attention  to  the  intrinsic 
value  of  a  stock,  i.  e.,  to  what  the  property  owned  by  a  cor- 
poration cost.  Nor  is  the  "face"  value  of  stock  of  any  moment. 
A  share  of  stock  may  be  nominally  worth  $100,  as  is  Stand- 
ard Oil,  but  if  it  pays  50  per  cent,  dividends  investors  are 
willing  to  pay  $500  for  each  $100  share.  On  the  other  hand, 
there  are  some  corporation  stocks  where  each  $100  share 
actually  represents  that  sum  invested,  yet,  owing  to  various 
conditions  do  not  yield  2  per  cent,  per  annum;  hence  their 
market  value  may  be  less  than  fifty  dollars  a  share.    There 


Significance  op  the  Trust  335 

is  no  remedy  to  be  found  for  the  Trust  in  the  mere  prevention 
of  stock  watering. 

Neither  would  publicity  of  accounts  avail.  Everybody 
knows  that  the  Standard  Oil  Trust  is  making  profits  of  over 
fifty  million  dollars  a  year.  Yet  what  good  does  the  knowledge 
do  the  public?  Admitting  that  oil  sells  at  double  what  it 
should,  what  are  you  going  to  do  about  it  ?  Why  has  not  Mr. 
Kockefeller  as  much  right  to  the  unearned  increment  derived 
from  his  monopoly  of  the  oil  business  as  has  Mr.  Astor  to 
the  unearned  increment  from  his  monopoly  of  land  in  New 
York  City? 

Mr.  Hearst  is  just  now  leading  a  great  crusade  in  favor 
of  the  municipal  ownership  of  public  utilities.  He  declares 
that  it  will  end  the  reign  of  the  grafters  and  the  bosses,  and 
this  may  be  true  enough.  Certainly  nobody  can  deny  that, 
speaking  generally,  municipal  ownership  is  an  excellent  thing 
and  a  great  step  in  the  right  direction;  but  the  question  I 
would  put  to  Mr.  Hearst  is :  "How  will  municipal  ownership 
guarantee  work  to  the  unemployed?  How  will  it  increase 
the  worker's  share  of  the  general  product  ?"  If  I  am  hungry 
and  take  one  step  or  even  ten  steps  toward  the  restaurant, 
no  one  would  think  of  saying  that  the  distance  so  covered 
would  lessen  my  hunger.  Municipal  ownership  is  only  a 
step — a  means  to  an  end, — the  end  being  the  establishment 
of  the  complete  co-operative  system. 

Look  at  Glasgow,  the  city  which  Mr.  Hearst  points  out  to 
us  as  having  so  benefitted  from  municipal  ownership,  and 
as  being  free  from  graft ;  yet  Glasgow  has  even  more  poverty 
than  New  York.  Of  course  I  will  readily  admit  that  it  would 
probably  have  still  more  poverty  and,  undoubtedly,  a  higher 
death  rate,  if  it  did  not  have  public  ownership,  yet  I  say 
that  this  admission  merely  grants  that  public  ownership  is  a 
good  reform.  It  is  good  so  far  as  it  goes,  but  quite  inadequate 
to  abolish  poverty. 

Let  us  by  all  means  have  municipal  ownership,  like  any 
other  good  reform ;  but  do  not  let  us  forget  that  the  thing  to 
be  abolished  is  the  cause  of  poverty,  namely  the  competitive 
system  itself,  and  that  until  we  abolish  the  cause  of  poverty 
we  cannot  expect  to  abolish  poverty.  In  order  to  establish 
the  co-operative  system  we  must  have  not  only  the  municipal 
ownership  of  municipal  utilities,  but  the  national  ownership 


336  Socialism  Inevitable 

of  national  utilities.  Let  us  have  public  ownership  of  all  the 
means  of  production  as  a  basis  for  our  co-operative  common- 
wealth, but  let  us  not  forget  the  fact  that  the  end  we  seek 
is  the  abolition  of  poverty,  not  merely  the  getting  rid  of 
grafters  and  political  bosses.  If  Mr.  Hearst  were  to  declare 
for  public  ownership  because  it  is  a  means  to  the  establishment 
of  the  entire  co-operative  system,  and  because  he  knows  that 
nothing  but  that  system  can  ever  abolish  poverty,  his  position 
would  be  much  more  logical  than  it  is  at  present. 

No  small  and  cramped  ideal  can  nerve  humanity  for  any 
great  upward  step.  The  Socialist  sees  in  the  co-operative 
commonwealth,  as  a  result  of  the  abolition  of  poverty,  a  future 
earth  peopled  by  men  who  have  become  a  race  of  gods,  free, 
healthy,  beautiful,  happy.  He  sees  a  society  where  men  love 
each  other,  love  the  world,  love  life,  where  men  will  love  man 
and  man  will  love  men. 

Life  will  then  be  worth  living  because  all  that  to-day  makes 
it  a  hideous  mockery  will  have  disappeared.  There  will  be 
no  fear  of  starvation  staring  one  in  the  face  because  one 
cannot  get  work.  Everyone  will  then  be  his  own  employer. 
There  will  be  no  living  in  dark,  noisome,  unhealthful  tene- 
ments; all  will  have  beautiful,  light,  sanitary  apartments. 
There  will  be  no  herding  of  people  in  cities  as  to-day,  for 
there  will  be  no  landlord  at  hand  to  demand  rent  for  each 
square  foot  of  land,  and  there  will  be  no  private  owner  of 
street  cars  at  hand  to  make  profit  each  minute  one  hangs  on 
the  straps  from  workshop  to  house. 

Each  worker  will,  if  he  wish,  live  in  his  own  cottage  in  the 
green  fields,  miles  from  his  work,  for  transportation  will  be 
so  rapid,  so  pleasant  and  so  cheap  that  he  will  have  no  reason 
to  crowd  into  the  tenements  of  a  city.  Besides  his  pay  will 
be  so  much  greater — for  under  Socialism  everyone  will  easily 
earn  more  in  value  than  $5,000  a  year  to-day — and  his  hours 
of  labor  so  much  less,  that  he  can  easily  afford  his  own  country 
home  and  have  plenty  of  time  to  enjoy  it.  He  will  not  feel 
that  he  must  save  his  earnings  to  provide  for  accidents  and 
old  age,  for  there  will  be  no  more  reason  for  saving  under 
Socialism  than  for  digging  a  well  on  the  shore  of  Lake  Su- 
perior. 

In  short,  there  will  be  abundance  for  all  when  the  people 
own  the  earth  and  are  not  under  tribute  to  landlords  and  cap- 


Significance  of  the  Trust  337 

italists.  The  earth  already  produces  sufficient  wealth;  the 
problem  to  be  solved  is  not  production,  but  distribution. 
Municipal  and  national  ownership  of  all  the  means  of  pro- 
duction, democratically  managed  by  the  workers  themselves, 
will  solve  the  problem  of  distribution  by  substituting  co-oper- 
ation for  competition. 

To  resume :  We  are  confronted  by  a  fact  and  not  a  theory. 
The  Trust  is  here  to  stay.  Democracy  has  been  ousted  from 
industry  by  autocracy,  and  as  our  political  institutions  are 
but  a  reflection  of  our  industrial  institutions,  we  should  not 
pretend  that  anything  but  a  sham  democratic  political  state 
remains. 

The  trade  unionists  pure  and  simple,  the  anti-imperialists, 
the  would-be  destroyers  of  trusts,  are  all  right  enough  senti- 
mentally, but  are  too  limited  in  their  vision.  This  nation 
has  the  mightiest  task  before  it  that  has  ever  been  given  to 
any  nation  to  perform.  The  ship  of  state  is  already  in  the 
cataract  of  a  great  social  Niagara.  It  is  not  too  late  to  save 
her  if  we  only  have  the  patience  and  brains  to  cut  our  political 
Welland  canal,  and  let  her  float  gently  into  the  Lake  Ontario 
of  Socialism.  Delay  is  dangerous.  That  we  shall  finally 
reach  our  metaphorical  lake — Socialism — is  absolutely  cer- 
tain; the  only  question  is,  shall  we  shoot  Niagara  or  go 
through  the  canal? 

Now  is  the  time,  if  ever,  when  this  country  needs  earnest 
men  who  know  the  truth,  and  are  not  afraid  to  cry  it  from 
the  housetops.  Once  let  us  get  into  the  rapids  and  nothing 
can  save  us  from  the  terrors  of  a  violent  revolution.  Democ- 
racy must  be  established  in  industry  and  re-established  in 
politics.  There  is  really  no  first  step  to  Nationalization  of 
Industry;  that  time  has  passed.  A  half-way  policy  is  indus- 
trially impossible,  ethically  unrighteous,  and  politically  un- 
sound. The  main  plank,  and  in  fact  the  only  necessary 
plank  in  our  political  platform  should  be:  "Let  the  Nation 
Own  the  Trusts,  and  let  the  workers  have  all  they  produce," 


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r.  ....       s 

/      Socialists  agree  that  until  the  belief  in  Socialism  gets  hold  of  the 
f       hearts  and  emotions  of  the  people,  more  as  a  religipn  than  as  an 
understanding   of   economic   events,   there   is   not   going   to   be  a 
\       social  revolution.  >i — - 

N^^'The  best  Socialist  is  one  who  cannot  only  sympathize  with 
poverty  and  wish  to  alleviate  it,  but  who  has  the-^niagination  to 
see  the  world  of  beauty  which  Socialism  promises  as  the^gTrafto 
be  realized.  ^_ 

S~*'  With  poverty  abolished  from  the  earth,  men  will  devote  the*n- 
(  selves  to  living  their  spiritual  lives,  and  Socialism  is  merely  i\ 
\j)ath,.to  this  end. 

It  is  just  the  pamphlet  to  pass  along  to  your  "church-going 
friend." 

11.  My  Master  the  Machine.    By  Roy  O.  Ackley.     Reprint  of 

an  excellent  propaganda  article  that  appeared  in  Wilshire's 
Magazine,  October,  1906.  Price,  2c.  per  copy;  $1.00  per 
100;  $7.50  per  1,000. 

12.  Socialism,  The  Hope  of  the  World.    By  Eugene  Wood,  author 

of  "Back  Home,"  etc.  Reprint  of  an  article  in  Wilshire's 
Magazine,  November,  1906.    Price,  5c.  a  copy;  $2.00  per  100. 

13.  The  Haywood-Moyer  Outrage.  By  Joseph  Wanhope.    $2.50 

per  100,  postpaid. 

A  more  important  pamphlet  concerning  the  labor  movement 
has  never  been  issued. 

It  is  a  trenchant  indictment  of  capitalism. 

It  will  "sell  like  hot  cakes"  at  your  meetings.  Especially  good 
for  outdoor  meetings.  You  should  see  that  every  union  man  in 
town  gets  one. 

It  has  gone  through  two  editions. 
Now  is  the  time  to  order. 


14,  That  Blessed  Word  Regulation.  By  Charles  Edward  Russell, 
author  of  "The  Greatest  Trust  of  All,"  "The  Uprising  of  the 
Many,"  etc.    Price,  2c. ;  100  copies,  $1.00. 

A  fifteen-page  pamphlet,  in  Russell's  clear  and  straight-from- 
the-shoulder  style,  that  is  just  the  thing  for  the  man  who  believes 
"something  ought  to  be  done,"  but  is  afraid  to  have  the  govern- 
ment take  things  in  hand. 


15.  The  World's  Castaways.     By  John   R.    McMahon,  author  of 

"Toilers  and  Idlers."    Price,  25c.  per  100,  $2.00  per  1,000. 

A  very  readable  leaflet  illustrated  with  cartoons  that  make  it 
sure  to  be  looked  into.  So  clear  that  the  dullest  must  see  its 
point,  and  how  it  applies  to  our  present  industrial  system. 

16.  An  Appeal  to  Women.       By  Mrs.   Gaylord  Wilshire.     Price, 

2c,  50c.  per  100,  postpaid. 

This  "appeal"  should  be  placed  in  the  hands  of  every  mother 
in  the  land.  It  illustrates  Socialism  from  the  woman's  point  of 
view. 

Send  for  a  copy  at  once,  if  you  have  not  read  it. 

17.  The  Division  of  Wealth;  a  lecture.       By  Jos.  Wanhope.    Ten 

cents  per  copy. 

A  large  24-page  pamphlet,  illustrated  with  thirty-one  of  the 
best  Socialist  cartoons  and  most  impressive  photographs  ever  pub- 
lished. Every  man  who  is  at  all  interested  in  politics,  even  if  only 
to  the  extent  of  voting,  should  read  it. 

18.  Markets  and  Misery.     By    Upton    Sinclair,    author    of    "The 

Jungle."     Price,  5c. 

A  little  masterpiece  in  Sinclair's  gripping,  vivid  style. 

The  most  unconcerned  must  read  it  through  once  the  first 
page  is  turned,  and  having  read  it,  will  be  forced  to  think.  An  ex- 
cellent propaganda  leaflet,  lengthy  enough  to  leave  a  lasting  impres- 
sion. 

19.  "A  Tip  for  the  Jobless  Man."     By  Jos.  Wanhope,  assistant 

editor  Wilshire's  Magazine.     Price,  30c.  per  100,  postpaid, 
$1.50  per  1,000,  express    collect. 

Illustrated  with  ten  particularly  apt  cartoons,  written  by  one 
of  the  most  logical  and  forceful  of  Socialist  writers,  especially  for 
the  man  who  has  been  "laid  off,"  and  carrying  an  argument  that 
he  simply  can't  get  away  from.  This  is  undoubtedly  the  best  prop- 
aganda pamphlet  for  use  to-day.  Selling  to  Socialist  Locals  by  the 
tens  of  thousands. 

A  sample  copy  free,  or  better,  order  100  postpaid  for  only  30c; 
$1.50  per  1,000;  $13.50  per  10,000,  plus  expressage. 


Entire  Set  of  these  Leaflets  Sent  Postpaid  for  25  Cents. 
WILSHIRE  BOOK  CO.,  NEW  YORK. 


a 


THE  IRON  HEEL" 


JACK  LONDON'S  TREMENDOUS  BOOK 

The  Greatest  Socialist  Novel  Ever  Written 

THE  IRON  HEEL  is  not  a  Utopian 
dream-story,  but  a  gripping  drama  of  the 
overthrow  of  the  capitalist  oligarchy  of 
the  present  time, — a  stirring  tale  of  the 
days  "  when  things  were  doing."  It 
never  loses  touch  with  present  condi- 
tions ;  it  has  the  intense  interest  of  a 
drama  of  real  life. 

London  is  an  acknowledged  genius. 

His  writings  cover  a  wide  range  in 
their  subject  matter,  but  all  are  master- 
pieces in  their  way. 

Every  one  of  them  reflects  the  fresh, 
strong,  inspiring  spirit  and  enthusiasm, 
the  healthy  fascination  of  this  interesting 
writer. 

Wilshire's  Special  Edition,  $1.20,  Postpaid 

ORDER  FROM 

WILSHIRE  BOOK  COMPANY 

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200  WILLIAM  STREET,  NEW  YORK 


The  Workingman's  Own  Novel 

Toilers  and  Idlers 

Beginning  his  story  in  Fifth  Avenue,  New  York,  in  the  homes 
of  the  "Idle  Rich,"  the  author  takes  the  reader  through  a  maze 
of  astonishing  experiences  among  the  so-called  "Upper  400." 

Rensen,  the  hero,  a  rich  young  man,  tiring  of  a  life  of  idleness, 
and  sick  of  dissolute  companions,  disguises  himself  and  goes  to 
work  in  an  iron  foundry,  which  he  afterwards  discovers  to  be  his 
own  property. 

In  the  trust  foundry,  among  the  brawny,  sooty-faced  men,  he 
learns  social  conditions,  meets  Unionists,  Anarchists,  Settlement 
Workers,  Inmates  of  Orphan  Homes,  and  others.  He  faces  the 
problems  of  his  relations  to  his  employees  complicated  with  a 
strike  and  riot. 

The  wasteful  life  of  the  "Idlers,"  the  secrets  behind  the 
polished  portals  of  upper  Fifth  Avenus,  the  follies  of  a  "Society 
Queen,"  the  lights  and  shadows  of  a  great  city,  the  shameless 
"Tenderloin,"  the  glittering  "White  Way,"  which  are  described 
in  the  opening  chapters,  form  a  vivid  contrast  to  the  heroic 
struggle  for  life  among  the  Workers. 

"Toilers  and  Idlers"  grew  from  the  experiences  and  suffer- 
ing of  a  hundred  thousand  men  and  women.  It  represents  the 
ideas  of  no  one  man,  but  is  the  essence  of  the  ideas  of  a  million 
men.  It  sprung  from  poverty,  suffering  and  want.  The  blood  of 
the  Army  of  Labor  is  woven  into  the  thread  of  its  story. 

If  you  are  a  worker  and  respect  and  love  your  class,  you  need 
this  book.  It  will  enlighten  and  broaden  and  strengthen  all  who 
read  its  pages, 

ONE  DOLLAR,   POSTPAID 


WILSHIRE   BOOK   COMPANY 

"THE  CLEARING  HOUSE  FOR  SOCIALIST  LITERATURE" 

200  WILLIAM   STREET  NEW  YORK 


Tne  Pmkerton   Labor   Spy 

First   Complete    Exposure   of   the   Pmkerton  Detective 

Agency.      A  Book  tnat  Helped  to  Save  tne  Lives 

of  Moyer,  Haywood  and  Pettibone.      Secret 

Letters  and  Documents  of  a  Colossal  Spy 

Bureau  tnat  Conspires  to  Murder. 

This  book  is  written  by  the  private  Stenographer  of  James 
McParland,  the  man  who  said  "Moyer,  Haywood  and  Pettibone 
will  never  leave  Idaho  alive." 

It  is  the  most  important  book  for  the  Labor  Movement  ever 
written. 

A  BRIEF  SYNOPSIS  OF  THE  CONTENTS  OF  "THE  PINKERTON 
LABOR  SPY." 

It  is  an  authoritative  history,  a  complete  expose,  for  the  first  time,  of  the 
secret  workings  of  PINKERTON'S  NATIONAL  DETECTIVE  AGENCY, 
and  the  relations  of  the  Agency  to  CAPITAL  AND  LABOR.  It  shows  that 
the  Agency  is  a  colossal  spy  bureau. 

ALL  THE  STATEMENTS  AND  CHARGES  made  in  this  book  are  fully 
warranted,  and  are  in  every  instance  borne  out  by  the  facts. 

THE  WORK  OF  A  NUMBER  OF  PINKERTON  DETECTIVES  OR 
OPERATIVES  is  fully  described,  the  name  of  the  operative  and  one  or  more 
of  his  secret  reports  being  given  in  every  case  where  necessary. 

A  GREAT  LIGHT  is  shed  on  the  Colorado  Labor  Troubles  which  have 
heretofore  been  shrouded  in  mystery. 

THE  WORK  OF  THE  AGENCY  IN  THE  MOYER-HAYWOOD-PETTI- 
BONE  CASE  is  discussed,  AND  THE  CONCLUSION  ARRIVED  AT 
SHOWS  VERY  PLAINLY  that  while  it  is  hardly  possible  that  the  officers  of 
the  Western  Federation  of  Miners  are  implicated  in  the  assassination  of  Ex- 
Governor  Steunenberg  of  Idaho,  it  is  much  more  than  probable  that  the  PINK- 
ERTON AGENCY  IS  GUILTY  OF  CONSPIRACY  TO  HANG  THE  UNION 
LEADERS. 

A  FINANCIAL  STATEMENT  PROVES  that  if  the  PINKERTON  DE- 
TECTIVE AGENCY  DEPENDED  for  success  upon  LEGITIMATE  DETEC- 
TIVE WORK,  THEY  WOULD  HAVE  TO  GO  OUT  OF  BUSINESS. 

"The  Pinkerton  Labor  Spy"  is  the  most  extraordinary  exposure  of  the  ma- 
chinery of  industrial  tyranny  that  I  have  ever  read  in  my  life.  It  will  do  more 
than  anything  yet  published  to  awaken  the  American  people  to  the  infamous 
crimes  against  labor  which  have  been  committed  in  Colorado.  I  appeal  to  the 
Labor  movement  to  place  a  copy  of  this  book  in  the  hands  of  every  workingman 
in  America.  UPTON  SINCLAIR. 

PRICE,  25  CENTS,  PAPER 
PUBLISHED  BY 

WILSHIRE  BOOK  COMPANY 

Clearing  House  for  all  Socialist  Literature 

200  WILLIAM  STREET  NEW  YORK,  N.  Y. 


WILSHIRES 
MAGAZINE 

A  Socialist  Monthly  Publication, 
which  justifies  its  existence  by  a 
paid,   proved  circulation  of  more   than 

^UU«>UUU   Copies   Each   Issue 

There  isn  t  a  place  on  earth,  -where  capitalism 
obtains  and  class  lines  have  been  formed, 
where   you   will   not  find   ^^ILSHIRES. 

^WILTSHIRE'S  wants  workers  to  get  more 
readers.  Every  reader  can  be  safely  counted 
upon  to  become  a  convert  to  Socialism,  and 
the  convert,  in  time,  becomes  a  missionary 
for  the  conversion  of  others,  ^^ere  after 
the  majority! 

Are  you  with  us  in  this  fight  for  the  eman- 
cipation or  the  race? 

WRITE  TO-DAY  FOR  SAMPLES  AND  TERMS 

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NEW  YORK 


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Six  Remarkable  Offers 
in  Socialist  Literature 

^J|*  You  will  never  again  have  such  a  chance,  and  if  you 
^J    delay  too  long,  you  will  lose  this  opportunity.     Up 

to  a  few  months  ago  these  books  were  not  to  be 
had  from  the  publishers,  even  in  hundred-lots,  at  the 
Price  we  are  now  offering  them,  and  We  Prepay 
Postage.  It's  up  to  you,  Comrades.  If  you  want  to 
have  a  good  working  Socialist  library,  snap  up  these  offers 
while  you  can. 

Combination  No.  1 

ON  THE  EVE.     By  Dr.  L.  Kampf $  .25 

SOUL   OF  MAN  UNDER   SOCIALISM.     By  Oscar 

Wilde    75 

AN  EYE  FOR  AN  EYE.    By  Clarence  Darrow 1.50 

Total  at  Publishers'  Price  $2.50,  FOR  $1.00  POSTPAID. 

Combination  No.  2 

AN  EYE  FOR  AN  EYE.    By  Clarence  Darrow $1.50 

A  COUNTRY  WITHOUT  STRIKES.     By  Henry  D. 

Lloyd   1.00 

PINKERTON  LABOR  SPY.      (Cloth.)     By  Morris 

Friedman   75 

Total  at  Publishers'  Price  $3.25,  FOR  $1.50  POSTPAID. 

Combination  No.  3 

SOUL  OF  MAN  UNDER  SOCIALISM.     By  Oscar 

Wilde  $  .75 

PINKERTON  LABOR  SPY.      (Cloth.)     By  Morris 

Friedman 75 

A  COUNTRY  WITHOUT  STRIKES.     By  Henry  D. 

Lloyd   1.00 

AN  EYE  FOR  AN  EYE.    By  Clarence  Darrow 1.50 

Total  at  Publishers'  Price  $4.00,  FOR  $2.00  POSTPAID. 


Combination  No.  4 

SOCIALISM  INEVITABLE.  By  Gaylord  Wilshire.  .$1.00 
BOSSISM  AND  MONOPOLY.  By  T.  C.  Spelling...  1.50 
A  COUNTRY  WITHOUT  STRIKES.     By  Henry  D. 

Lloyd    1.00 

AN  EYE  FOR  AN  EYE.    By  Clarence  Darrow 1.50 

PINKERTON  LABOR  SPY.      (Cloth.)      By  Morris 

Friedman    75 

Total  at  Publishers'  Price  $5.75,  FOR  $3.00  POSTPAID. 

Combination  No.  5 

COMMUNISM    IN    CENTRAL    EUROPE    IN    THE 
TIME    OF    THE    REFORMATION.      By    Karl 

Kautsky   $3.00 

SOUL  OF  MAN  UNDER  SOCIALISM.     By   Oscar 

Wilde    75 

BOSSISM  AND  MONOPOLY.  By  T.  C.  Spelling. . .  1.50 
A  COUNTRY  WITHOUT  STRIKES.     By  Henry  D. 

Lloyd    1.00 

AN  EYE  FOR  AN  EYE.    By  Clarence  Darrow 1.50 

Total  at  Publishers'  Price  $7.75,  FOR  $4.00  POSTPAID. 

Combination  No.  6 

THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  EXISTENCE.     By  Walter 

Thomas  Mills  $2.50 

THE     STORY     OF     A     LABOR     AGITATOR.     By 

Joseph  R.   Buchanan 1.50 

BOSSISM  AND  MONOPOLY.  By  T.  C.  Spelling..  1.50 
A  COUNTRY  WITHOUT  STRIKES.     By  Henry  D. 

Lloyd    1.00 

AN  EYE  FOR  AN  EYE.    By  Clarence  Darrow 1.50 

PINKERTON  LABOR  SPY.      (Cloth.)     By  Morris 

Friedman    75 

Total  at  Publishers'  Price  $8.75,  FOR  $5.00  POSTPAID. 

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